The Word of mAn[S]o0r: The battle of the boots....

It seems like everyone is having a corporate battle these days to make their brands come out on top. But whats even more interesting to hear is, two World reknowned companies in footwear, Adidas and Puma actually have been having this battle for more than 6 decades. Now thats a pretty long time to fight! and what more.. they have common roots. Both companies were founded by warring brothers Adolf and Rudi Dassler respectively from Herzogenaurach, Germany!!!

An excerpt from the article on the history of the two companies follows..

Born into a family of cobblers, Adolf and Rudolf Dassler were not
always at odds. In the 1920s, Adi and Rudi, as they were more commonly
known, worked happily side by side at the Gebrüder Dassler Schuhfabrik
(Dassler Brothers Shoe Factory).

Adolf developed some studs, business boomed under the Nazis and by
the 1936 Olympics Jesse Owens was running in Dassler spikes. But by the
fall of the Third Reich the fraternal relationship was in tatters. "We
will probably never know the real reason why Adi and Rudi fell out,"
sighs Ernst Dittrich, the head of Herzogenaurach's town archive. "It
was like a marriage that goes terribly, terribly sour."

Elderly residents in this 13th century town still gossip that the
brothers split because Adi slept with Rudi's wife, that the two wives
hated each other, that Rudi fathered Adi's son and that Rudi - the less
successful entrepreneur of the pair - had his hands in the petty-cash
box.

The most likely snapping point came from a thoughtless comment made
one night in 1943 as the two brothers and their wives slept in the
family air raid shelter. "There come those pig dogs again!" raved Adi
as his brother clambered down the steps. From that moment, no one could
convince Rudi that Adi had been talking about the RAF bombers, not
about him.

Rudi's bitterness increased as he was shipped off to an American
prisoner of war camp and Adi carried on running the family business
without him. In 1948 Rudi returned and set up his own factory on the
other side of the river, now Puma, taking loyal staff with him.

There were varying successes on both sides as Herzogenaurach's two
shoemaking companies grew. Although Puma still claims it invented the
removable football boot stud, Adi Dassler and his Adidas company is
credited with winning the 1954 World Cup for Germany by providing the
team with them.

But Rudi scored points against his brother when Pele won the 1962 World Cup for Brazil - in Puma boots.

The pair threw ludicrous amounts of money at absurd court battles.
In 1958, Rudi Dassler and Puma took out an injunction to prevent Adi
marketing Adidas stock as "the best sports shoes in the world". The
court ruled in Rudi's favour but gave Adi a week to remove all
advertising. In the seven days he had left, Adi convinced an
Adidas-loyal fishmonger to paste the slogan on his fish van and park it
outside Rudi's office window.

The tit-for-tat ethic continued through the generations. In the
early 1980s, a young Boris Becker knocked on the door of Adidas with a
Romanian manager, hoping for a sponsorship deal. When Adidas boss,
Horst Dassler, refused, his manager, Ion Tiriac, drove straight over
the river to Puma and demanded a meeting. "Go on," he taunted Rudi's
son, Armin Dassler, who was the Puma chief. "Take on Boris. That'll
really make your cousin mad." It was all Armin needed to hear to sign
the then unknown Becker under a £100,000 advertising contract.