The sneaker industry is in turmoil.

This summer, major shoe brands from Nike to Adidas to Under Armour to On have each expressed skittishness about the retail environment for sneaker sales. Consumers appear unwilling, or unable, to pay full price for athletic shoes. And on Tuesday, the chairman at Dick’s Sporting Goods—one of the largest global retailers selling sports gear—put a fine point on it: “This industry is going through a bit of a transition.”

This transition follows a multiyear saga initiated when sneaker behemoth Nike initially pulled back from wholesale, opening shelf space for upstart brands like Hoka and On.

For a few years, that created lots of competition and new styles for consumers to choose from. Other legacy brands like Adidas saw success with refreshed classics like the Samba, and Nike eventually came back into the retail fold. But the consumer excitement from these changes appears to be waning.

Dick’s Sporting Goods and its subsidiary chain , which together operate some 3,100 stores globally, reported weaker-than-expected earnings results on Tuesday and gave a surprisingly dim outlook for the rest of the year, particularly at Foot Locker, whose primary business is sneaker sales. Pro-forma comparable store sales at Foot Locker are now expected to be flat or decline 2% for fiscal year 2026 over 2025, compared to the previous forecast of 1.5% to 3% growth.

Shares of Dick’s fell more than 27% in early trading on Tuesday to $130.

Asked by a JPMorgan Chase analyst if the industry was facing “a hangover” from the various shoe brand dynamics, Dick’s chairman Ed Stack said, “We have the hangover right now.” He added the industry “will be experiencing some pain, at least through the end of the year,” but he remained enthusiastic overall about the sporting goods industry.

Further troubling Wall Street is that the final two quarters of the year overlap with the most important sales seasons for footwear: back-to-school and the winter holidays.

To be sure, not all segments of the sportswear industry are troubled. Dick’s executives emphasized that performance footwear, and running in particular, are selling well, but “lifestyle” shoes broadly aimed for comfort and fashion are falling out of favor. Furthermore, stores in Europe, the Middle East and Africa are facing heavier discounting than those in North America. 

But while casual sneakers aren’t selling well, Ugg boots and Birkenstock slides “are really on fire,” Stack said. “I do think there is a shift toward this brown shoe piece of [the business].”

Stack isn’t the only one weighing in on the state of the troubled sneaker industry. Here is a brief recap of how several of the major brands have viewed the market in their summer earnings reports.

Nike

Still the largest sneaker and athletic apparel maker by global sales, the industry leader told analysts in June the company expects its own sales to decline low- to mid-single digits in the latter half of 2026. The swoosh has already been adjusting its inventory this year to reduce promotions—industry-speak for when products go on sale. Matthew Friend, Nike’s outgoing chief financial officer, told Wall Street that the company faces several headwinds unrelated to consumer demand or price sensitivity, including evolving tariff policies and geopolitical disruption in the Middle East. Nonetheless, Friend said Nike was going to reduce sell-in to wholesale partners in the coming months to stave off future discounting.

Adidas

The German sportswear giant carried a halo from this summer’s World Cup, serving as an official FIFA sponsor and the outfitter for both finalists, Spain and Argentina. It saw a sales boost of soccer products in tandem with the North American-hosted tournament. But chief executive Bjorn Gulden said the company has held back on selling to wholesale partners to avoid promotional environments, particularly in Europe and North America, and he couldn’t predict exactly when sales challenges will abate.

”We hope and we believe when we look at the order book that Q4 will actually be an improvement,” Gulden said on a July earnings call. “But again, we don’t control it alone, right? So yes, wholesale footwear should start to improve. If that is Q4 or Q1, I don’t know.” 

Under Armour

The Baltimore-based athletic brand said earlier this month it would once again reset its business, cutting roughly 25% of products from its pipeline over the next year-and-a-half as it hopes to sell fewer products overall but more at full price. The overhaul immediately followed an earlier 25% product cull completed in the last fiscal year.

“We know the brand has been too reliant on promotion,” said chief executive Kevin Plank. “The marketplace still carries too much complexity. The issues are clear. The work is underway.”

Looking ahead, “While we have several new products we’re excited to bring to market over the next six and 12 months, especially in things we have high confidence in, we’re already making a lot of really good product,” Plank said. “I just don’t think we’ve done a good enough job selling it.”

On

The Swiss sneaker maker suffered its worst single-day stock drop on Aug. 11 after executives told Wall Street they intentionally pulled back on selling to retailers, therefore reducing volume sales in the interest of making sure consumers don’t see markdowns on their shoes.

Frank Sluis, On’s chief financial officer, said the company “chose to hold back sell-in rather than ship volume that would build inventory in the channel and put full-price integrity at risk. It costs us some wholesale growth.”

Hoka

Unlike other competitors, the parent company of hit running brand Hoka, Deckers Outdoor Corporation, maintained its sales guidance for its current fiscal year, and reported its first-ever $1 billion quarter for the three months ended in June. CEO Stefano Caroti told Wall Street in July the company saw higher sales to retailers and full-price sales to consumers of Hoka shoes in North America, and the brand is expected to see  “high-single-digit percentage growth” over the remainder of its fiscal year ending in March.

Deckers also owns Ugg boots, which are projected to grow at the mid-single-digit percentage rate over the same period.