How Decathlon HK democratises sports through community building

Decathlon Hong Kong is evolving its community spirit into a high-octane engagement strategy. By rolling out a year-round calendar of initiatives—from specialised running clubs to inclusive cycling sessions—the brand is shifting its focus from simple retail to deep consumer connection.

In an interview with MARKETING-INTERACTIVE, Matthew Li (pictured), head of brand and marketing at Decathlon Hong Kong, said that since the official launch of the "Decathlon run club" last year, the brand is now offering members a year-round calendar of activities and is even partnering with local running clubs on initiatives such as coffee runs and shoe testing.

Targeting running beginners, the "Decathlon run club" comes from the brand's observation and conversations with the local community that, while running is the fastest growing sport in Hong Kong, many new runners face frustrations such as not knowing how to get started, what gear to buy, or what tips to follow, according to Li.

"The more established running clubs out there are really more focused on elite runners, such as building a team to run the marathon. But the reality is, many people just don't know how to get started,” Li said. He added: 

For us, the journey matters. The core idea is that we want to democratise the whole thing. Our approach is to partner with them to grow.

Behind the KIPRUN campaign

To support this community-building effort, Decathlon introduced KIPRUN earlier this year — a premium running brand dedicated to high-performance road and trail running.

Don't miss: Decathlon HK empowers marathon runners with gear and community spirit

Launched this January as the first phase of the marathon campaign, KIPRUN is built on the idea "More runs, more life." The campaign slogan, "The journey matters", reminds runners that success starts with their hard work — even before the race begins.

While Havas Hong Kong helped with online and offline media, Li said this was very important for phase one, when the goal was to raise awareness, so they needed broad exposure through video ads and out-of-home placements. He added:

It has set a very strong foundation for our subsequent marketing initiatives to reach out to the target audience, and also for the full year of running, and even for the Decathlon brand.

In the campaign preparation stage, Havas leveraged its AI tool Converged, which treats human and AI input as equally important. The tool showed Decathlon its awareness, consideration, and recommendation levels in Hong Kong, and used data to highlight key areas for development, such as audience growth opportunities and mapping, according to Li.

The campaign used Decathlon's brand DNA to align with KIPRUN's philosophy: performance is technical, but made for every runner. The brand supports your full journey, not just the race or winning, Li said.

Growing with beginners across sports

Beyond KIPRUN, Decathlon Hong Kong will roll out programmes and partnerships for each phase of the running season this year, covering the summer holiday and the September application window for the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon.

To address the needs of new runners at different life stages, Decathlon Hong Kong has partnered with Ka Fung Wong, a coach from the Decathlon run club, to share advice on social media. The brand believes Wong is the right person to explain how beginners can prepare for running and what they should pay attention to while running, Li said. 

"Many of our runners are beginners now, and we want to gradually turn them into experts. This is both a customer acquisition strategy and a long-term commitment — building for the future while attracting different types of runners today,” he added.

To support its accessible brand and target running beginners, Li said Decathlon has tapped its high-performing staff to build a community. For example, KIPRUN recently signed a store colleague who placed 27th in the Hong Kong half-marathon, as the brand sees his growth potential. “Since he's also our colleague, we felt this fits our brand even better. So we've engaged him to create content for our social media as well,” he said. 

In fact, Decathlon Hong Kong has taken its community-building from running into road biking, Li said. After unofficial research with dozens of local cycling clubs, the brand found the sport is very male-dominated — only about three clubs have sections for women. "So we see it as an opportunity to dive into road cycling," Li said.

In 2026, the brand is committed to building the women's cycling community through dedicated sessions and expert coaching, creating a professional yet pressure-free space for female riders to access elite gear and technical guidance, Li said.

Long-term KPI on brand perception

With the brand long seen as low cost, Li said the KIPRUN campaign has a long-term KPI beyond sales, focused on brand perception, as Decathlon Hong Kong's weakness lies in how customers view its product quality and trustworthiness.

"We need to convince our target audience that affordable doesn't mean low quality. People focus too much on the 'money' part of value for money, but 'value' matters just as much. A good pair of running shoes can be very competitive on price relative to its quality,” Li said.

Looking ahead, Li said KIPRUN has ambitions to expand into the medium to long term market, specifically the intermediate and advanced running segments, since the brand has already built a strong foundation at the beginner level.

"Through our social listening on the expert-level running shoes KIPSTORM TEMPO and KIPSTORM ELITE, combined with our sales data, we can see that we are expanding into that market," Li said. He added:

We want to show we're not just for beginners. Slowly, we want to reach different levels of runners and nurture them from beginner to intermediate, then to expert.

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