I had the pleasure of meeting Brian at a Zoot Ultra team summit earlier this year where he had just finished the Oceanside 70.3.  Brian is truly a "practice what you preach" individual who has been at the helm of Zoot for some of the most explosive growth in the company's storied history.  Read on to learn how this Harvard graduate and former pro soccer player keeps tabs up with his beautiful family, leads a bellweather triathlon company and manages to place among the front of the pack at major long distance triathlons.

You have managed to straddle two very time consuming positions, one as being the President of Zoot Sports and the other as a top performing age grouper who even qualified for Kona!  Tell us about how you plan your time and work in both disciplines.

I don’t consider myself a top age grouper but I do love to compete and to challenge myself.  I am thankfully a self-disciplined person so I make very efficient use of my time.  Leading up to a 70.3 race I can usually fit in about 10 hours of workouts per week.  I usually workout around 5:30am and I am almost always alone so that I can use every minute.  When I’m at work I don’t spend a lot of time screwing around so that I can accomplish as much as possible within a day.  Between my work, traveling, family and coaching my kids I truly don’t get as much sleep as I should!

When you look at the triathlon industry as a whole, what are the top 3 things that Zoot does to separate itself from its primary competitors?

First we spend more time, energy and resources supporting triathlon than any other brand.  We’ve consistently supported triathletes, retailers and events for 25 years.  Second, we spend more R&D dollars developing products for triathletes than any brand in the world.  In the past 3 years these R&D investments have created the Ultra Tri Short, the Zenith Wetzoot, the new Zoot Ultra shoes and a very exciting product launch that will occur this Fall.  Third, we are the only brand that provides the athlete with a head-to-toe product solution.  Zoot is the only brand that an athlete can wear (head-to-toe) from the first day of training to the swim start, through the bike and to the finish line of the run.

Doesn't the triathlon apparel industry do as well as the mainstream apparel industry?

The mainstream apparel brands have a distinctive advantage within the supply chain.  These brands offer factories the opportunity to make a large quantity of simple garments that they market as “technical.”  On the other hand truly technical niche brands like Zoot ask the factories to produce highly complicated products with dramatically less units.  The obvious result is that the larger brands can obtain more leverage over the factories, thus ensuring better on time deliveries, better costing and a better flow of garments.  In contrast, the niche triathlon brands have a distinct product development advantage over the larger brands.  We are simply closer to the athletes, closer to the sport itself and can focus on developing true product solutions for the athletes instead of focusing on hitting a specific price points, or creating a product that meets a specific corporate sales target.

It can be frustrating for newbies to find various 'brick and mortar' vendors who carry various brands of triathlon apparel.  What is Zoot's vision to enhance the consumer experience in gaining access to its brands? 

Our first priority is to help build the entire triathlon industry so we always support brick and mortar retailers as well as we can.  Thankfully, there is significant growth in both the number of triathlon specialty retailers and run and cycle shops that carry triathlon gear.  Knowing that many multi-sport athletes still don’t live near a tri store we partner closely with e-tailers such as Tri Sports.com as they do a great job telling the Zoot brand story.  The best tool for us to educate our customers is through zootsports.com.  Athletes can interact with our brand and our products in an unique way. 

It's 3 years from now.  What is Zoot doing that to lead the triathlon marketplace?

Our mission is to be the premier multi-sport brand in the world.  With this in mind we have 2 main responsibilities:  1) To financially support the health of the industry through sponsoring athletes and events, advertising in core publications like Triathlete and partnering with quality retailers.  2) To create true product solutions for our athletes. 

We focus on these key responsibilities today and we’ll be focused on the same responsibilities 3 years from now.  I think we do a good job of this today in the US where we are the #1 brand.  We are spending a lot of energy and money over the next 3 years in other markets like Europe (where we are quickly becoming the #1 brand), Australia (where we are the #2 brand) and South Africa (where we are the #1 brand).  If we can play the same leadership role globally in 3 years that we currently play in the US then I will be happy.

From a sponsorship perspective, Zoot has really linked its positioning to Sam McGlone and Mirinda Carfrae.  What are the top characteristics of the prototypical Zoot professional? 

We have 3 global “marquis athletes” that we closely align with the Zoot brand:  Luke Bell, Sam and Mirinda.  We also sponsor about 50 other professionals worldwide and hundreds of top age groupers through our Zoot Ultra Team and the Zoot/GU Team.  The characteristics for all of the athletes that become part of the Zoot family are the same – first they need to be good people, second they need to be good ambassadors for the sport and our brand and third they need to be competing to win during their races. 

Being in the sporting goods industry we’ve all spent a lot of time with professional athletes from Shaq to Cobi Jones (US Pro Soccer Player) to Luke Bell.  The single most important take-away from these experiences is that you and your team need to enjoy spending time with the athletes because if they don’t become part of your extended family then you will never realize their full value as ambassadors and product testers. 

That being said, we couldn’t be happy with Luke, Sam and Mirinda!

The new line of Zoot shoes have been a big hit in only 4-5 months of availability.  What do you point to as the biggest drivers of this line's success? 

We are extremely excited by the early success of our shoes.  We’ve sold 2.5x the number of units that we projected and we’ve been trying to catch up to the demand since they day we launched.  I think our shoes are representative of simply listening to our athletes and participating in the sport ourselves.  From the day I stated at Zoot we began hearing complaints about running shoes from our athletes.  After a while we pulled together a group of our best athletes and product feedback testers and we talked about the problems they were experiencing.  From there we simply boiled the list down to the 4 most important problems and we spent 2 years finding solutions to address those problems.

The product development process can and should really be this simple.  Unfortunately many companies forget to listen to their athletes and become more focused on hitting margin goals and sales targets.  As everyone knows, Zoot is a core user of our own products; we simply won’t allow ourselves to become complacent with our product. 

You took a lot of heat from your friends and co-workers for not takingthe Kona slot you earned at last year's Ford Ironman Coeur d'Alene.  Do you have any regrets, almost a year later? 

I took more heat than I thought I would but I made the decision with my wife and family before the race so I knew it was the right thing to do.  Training for CDA meant that I missed a lot of the special “little things” with my family like cooking them breakfast and snuggling on the couch on a Saturday morning.  We all sacrificed for my race and I didn’t want to do that twice in one year.  I will say it was difficult to be in Kona knowing that I should have been racing.  I’m hopeful that I can get another chance for Kona in the future.

Regardless of success of the particular product, what is your favorite Zoot product and why?

No contest – the Ultra Run Short.  This short is another example of a pure product development process.  We laughed at how much time we all spend making sure we have the perfect compression shorts during a race but then we throw on a basic run short with a cheap liner and head out for long run.  We knew we could do better.  The Ultra Run Short provides 80% of the compression that I get in my Ultra Tri Shorts, plus I get a “modesty curtain” so my non-tri friends don’t make fun of me when I run along the coast.  Further the waistband is from an underwear factory so it won’t dig in even after two hours.  But my favorite feature is the pockets.  I hate running with pockets that wiggle and move when I run, so having pockets that are tightly held to my hips make carrying a GU and an I-Pod very enjoyable.

What are your triathlon race goals this year?

I have so many work and personal goals that I like to use racing as an outlet to enjoy and to challenge myself.  I often will ride and run without a clock or speedometer as I need my workouts to be a mental release.  I knew my work and family schedule was going to be crazy this summer so I did two 70.3 races early in the season (Oceanside and St. Croix) then I will finish the season at Clearwater.  I’m hoping to fit a few Olympic or Spring events in between.

Brian Enge
Born: June 26, 1970
Age: 38
First Triathlon: Fairlee Triathlon in Fairlee, Vermont
Family: Wife - Ceci; Derek (9), Sirerra (8), Skylar (6), Larsen (4)
Lives: Cardiff, California
Interesting Fact: Played college and professional soccer

Thanks for the time, Brian!  Best of luck with the big Zoot launch this Fall and your continued success at Clearwater.

Interview by Max Wunderle

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