slazenger

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| caption1 = Tennis balls and parts manufactured by Dunlop Slazenger, on display at the Design Museum in London

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| caption2 = Roger Federer hitting a Slazenger tennis ball at Wimbledon. The brand has sponsored the tournament since 1902, the oldest sponsorship in sport.

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In 1881, Ralph and Albert Slazenger, Jewish brothers from Manchester, established a shop on London's Cannon Street, selling rubber sporting goods. Slazenger quickly became a leading manufacturer of sporting equipment for golf and tennis. Four years after the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club held its first-ever championships in 1877, Slazenger produced 'The New Game of Lawn Tennis' (tennis rackets and balls) complete in a box.{{cite book |last1=Williams |first1=Jean |title=A Contemporary History of Women's Sport, Part One: Sporting Women, 1850-1960 |date=2014 |publisher= Taylor & Francis |page=11}} In 1883, Slazenger filed a patent for a net for table tennis.{{cite news |title=It's table tennis, NOT ping-pong |url=https://www.nbcolympics.com/news/its-table-tennis-not-ping-pong |access-date=6 June 2024 |publisher=NBC}}

Their plant in Barnsley, South Yorkshire manufactured tennis balls and exported them round the world.{{cite news| url=https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2002/jun/24/tennis.wimbledon20027|title=New balls, please|date=24 June 2002|work=The Guardian}} The plant closed in 2002, and production is now based in the Philippines.

In 1902, Slazenger was appointed as the official tennis ball supplier to The Championships at Wimbledon, and it remains the longest unbroken sporting sponsorship in history.{{cite web| title= At 113 Years and Counting, Slazenger Maintains the Longest Sponsorship in Sports| url= http://www.sesponsorshipgroup.com/sponsorship-figures/2015/11/3/at-113-years-and-counting-slazenger-maintains-the-longest-sponsorship-in-sports|publisher=S&E Sponsorship Group|date=4 November 2015|url-status= dead|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160617070504/http://www.sesponsorshipgroup.com/sponsorship-figures/2015/11/3/at-113-years-and-counting-slazenger-maintains-the-longest-sponsorship-in-sports| archive-date=17 June 2016}}

In 1910, a public company was incorporated to acquire Slazenger and Sons, "manufacturers of sports equipment, india rubber, gutta percha and waterproof goods, leather merchants and dealers",The Times, 29 May 1911 which floated on the stock market. In 1931, Slazenger acquired H. Gradidge and Sons.The Times, 25 February 1932

During the Second World War, Slazenger, like most manufacturers of non-essential items in the UK, redirected its production to manufacture a wide variety of components for military purposes, utilising their expertise in wood and rubber manufacturing.{{cite news |title=Slazenger Hockey Club |url=https://slazengerhc.co.uk/about/ |access-date=6 June 2024 |agency=Slazengerhc.co.uk |quote=During World War 2, Slazenger was one of several sports companies to pool their collective resources in order to manufacture equipment for the war effort. When the other factories were damaged during the Blitz, the whole consolidated effort was moved to the Horbury Bridge Albion Mills in 1941.}}

On 15 September 1940, during the Blitz on London, incendiary bombs fell on the Slazenger factory and on the Gradidge factory in Woolwich.{{cite news |title=Slazenger history |url= https://www.slazengerheritage.com/history/ | website=SlazengerHeritage.com | publisher=| date= |access-date=6 October 2021}} The competing William Sykes Ltd factory at Horbury was undamaged by the bombings. Slazenger and Gradidge were able to continue production at other facilities but began a series of mergers with competing companies. In 1942, it acquired William Sykes Ltd to broaden its wartime production facilities.The Times, 14 September 1944 Around 1940, Slazenger acquired F. H. Ayres. Founded in 1810 by Edward Ayres, the firm manufactured a range of sporting equipment but was best known as a high-quality manufacturer of archery equipment and in particular the bow (or longbow, as it is more commonly known).

The following lists a snapshot of some of the company's larger contracts completed for the UK Government between 1939 and 1945, as recorded by Slazenger, Gradidge, Sykes and Ayres in 1946:

In Australia, Slazenger produced naval utility launches at Newcastle, New South Wales, for the country's war effort.

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| caption2 = Match ball from the 1966 FIFA World Cup Final at the National Football Museum in Manchester, England

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In its heyday, the Slazenger, Gradidge, Sykes and Ayres empire stretched across the world with either licensed distributors or agents and/or manufacturing operations with which the company had partnerships or licensing agreements. Distributors were found in New Zealand and Africa, as well as remote locations such as Iceland, Newfoundland, Madagascar and Bolivia.

In the days when wooden tennis racquets held no peer, brands such as Slazenger and Dunlop were dominant forces in the global market. However, with the rise in popularity of metal tennis racquets from the early 1980s and then the fast transition to even more popular composite materials such as fiberglass, graphite and Kevlar, more brands emerged and became popular due to their ability to meet consumer trends and demand for the new technology. Slazenger, in contrast, was slow to react. The company could not re-gear its existing factories to produce products using the new materials and there was a major existing investment in plant and raw materials. The company tried to market its product against these new products using quality as its unique selling point, but the quality level of imports quickly improved and Slazenger lost popularity and fell from prominence.

• 1959: Ralph Slazenger Jr. sold the family business to Dunlop Rubber.{{cite book|author1=Klaus Schmidt|author2=Chris Ludlow|title=Inclusive Branding: The Why and How of a Holistic Approach to Brands|url=https://archive.org/details/inclusivebrandin00klau_0|url-access=registration|year=2002|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-51329-7|page=[https://archive.org/details/inclusivebrandin00klau_0/page/185 185]}}
• 1985: Dunlop Rubber was purchased by BTR plc, which formed a Sports Group combining Slazenger with the Dunlop Sport branded goods.
• 1996: BTR sold Dunlop Sport in a management buyout for £300 million – the buyout was backed by investment company Cinven. The new company was to be known as "Dunlop Slazenger".{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/03/09/business/dunlop-and-btr-reach-an-accord.html |title= Dunlop and BTR Reach an Accord |accessdate=1 March 2025 |work=The New York Times |date=9 March 1985}}
• 2004: CINVen sold Dunlop Slazenger to Sports Direct International for a reported £40 million,{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/dec/27/sports-direct-sells-dunlop-for-137m|title=Sports Direct sells Dunlop for $137m|last=Wood|first=Zoe|date=27 December 2016|work=The Guardian|language=en|access-date=11 July 2018}} who in turn sold on the rights to the Slazenger Golf brand in Europe to JJB Sports.{{cite news |title=Slazenger's £10m deal with JJB |url=https://golfbusinessnews.com/news/corporate/slazengers-GBP10m-deal-with-jjb/ |access-date=6 June 2024 |work=Golf Business News}}

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The purchase of Dunlop Slazenger by Sports World International (SWI) did not confer global rights to the brand. SWI chose not to diversify the brands it acquired internally, and thus strain its own resources and finances, but to licence them globally. With Slazenger, this was achieved successfully, with the Slazenger name being seen on a wide range of products not previously associated with the brand, such as sunglasses, toiletries and push bikes.

In Australia and New Zealand, the Slazenger brand is owned and licensed by Pacific Brands, with full and exclusive rights to sell and distribute throughout those territories. From the early 2000s due to poor management sales plummeted. Rather than investing in the brand, the Slazenger management began downsizing staff numbers, closing branches, cutting back long-standing sponsorship as well as stripping back costs elsewhere within the business. Despite these radical moves the Slazenger brand still ultimately offered no real return to Pacific Brands and in 2010/11 they sub-licensed it to Spartan Sports who had been operating in Australia since 2005 and is owned by Spartan Sports in Jallandhar, India (established in 1954).

Range of products under the brand Slazenger includes:[https://store.slazenger.com/ Slazenger store] on Slazenger, 16 August 2020

File: A textile label showing the difference in average height around the world (Polo shirt).jpg]]

During its peak, many famous cricket players such as Sir Don Bradman, Sir Garfield Sobers, Sir Viv Richards, Sir Len Hutton, Denis Compton, Rohan Kanhai, Mark Waugh, Jacques Kallis, Jason Roy, James Anderson Geoffrey Boycott used Slazenger's bats and products. The Pakistan cricket team wore the Slazenger kit in their winning campaign during the 2009 ICC World Twenty20.{{cite web|url=http://www.slazenger.com/all-time-greatest/ |title=Slazenger – All-Time Greatest |access-date=29 September 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716085614/http://www.slazenger.com/all-time-greatest/ |archive-date=16 July 2011 }} In tennis, Fred Perry switched to Slazenger tennis rackets in 1932 before winning his first Wimbledon title in 1934.

There are also many famous golf players who have used Slazenger products, such as Jack Nicklaus, Seve Ballesteros, Tom Weiskopf, Tom Watson and Johnny Miller.{{cite news |title=Slazenger History |url=https://www.slazengerheritage.com/history/?srsltid=AfmBOoonrlyezAiVN9G7CY7Fnw2TO2t7jj60wUx4TvLzNSqzXZQtbo6Y |access-date=27 February 2025 |website=Slazengerheritage.com}} The first Slazenger golf clubs were manufactured by Gow of the Glasgow Golf Club in 1890, followed by their first golf ball, the 'Guttie', in 1891; Harold Hilton won the 1892 and 1897 Open Championship using Slazenger golf balls. Besides professional golf players, film-star Sean Connery also wore the Slazenger v-neck jumper while playing golf in his free time.{{cite news |title=Sean Connery and Slazengers jumpers |url=https://www.slazengerheritage.com/sean-connery-slazenger-jumpers-golf/ |access-date=6 October 2021 |agency=Slazenger Heritage}} Furthermore, in the golf scene in the James Bond film Goldfinger (1964) which took place at Stoke Park Golf Club in Buckinghamshire, he wears a burgundy v-neck Slazenger jumper and the Slazenger brand of golf balls are shown on screen and mentioned several times in dialogue—Bond: "You play a Slazenger 1, don't you?"—as they play a key plot point.{{cite news |title=Goldfinger inspired Sean Connery's lifelong love affair with golf |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/golf/2614659/Goldfinger-inspired-Sean-Connerys-lifelong-love-affair-with-golf-golf.html |access-date=31 August 2022 |work=The Telegraph}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.slazengerheritage.com/legends/|title=Slazenger Heritage {{!}} Sport legends and iconic jumpers|work=slazengerheritage|access-date=27 September 2018|language=en-US}}

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Category:British brands

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Category:1881 establishments in England

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