It has left such an indelible mark on Liverpool fashion
Robert Wade Smith, who founded Wade Smith, in his office(Image: TRINITY MIRROR COPYRIGHT/REACH CONTENT ARCHIVE)
It’s now been decades since a dad brought 30 pairs of adidas trainers to Liverpool and turned it into a £17 million company. In two decades of its existence, Wade Smith shaped a distinctive Liverpool style which was adopted nationwide.
Decades ago, founder Robert Wade Smith, originally from Bradford, came to Liverpool as an apprentice for adidas, travelling to the city at weekends to stock their concessions. Spotting a gap in the market, he noticed the city’s love of rare and designer trainers, which inspired him to open his own business.
First on Slater Street and later Mathew Street, Wade Smith began in 1982, bringing designer wear to shoppers at a time when most of the big labels were staying away from the city. For many, it was the first place they bought a pair of trainers or were introduced to popular fashion trends of their generation.
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Last week, the ECHO reported how best friends Daniel Yuen and Kieran Riddell-Austin are now turning over £76 million with their successful sportswear brand Montirex and were named in The Sunday Times 100 – Britain’s fastest-growing private businesses list, spotlighting the fastest-growing private companies in the UK. And this reminded us of the success of Wade Smith, which left such an indelible mark on Liverpool fashion.
Back in 1998, Wade Smith’s turnover was £17 million, and the company was about to embark on a new venture. On June 30 that year, the ECHO reported: “Robert Wade Smith was one of the first people in the country to realise that sporty continental training shoes could take off as fashion items.
A story about Wade Smith and Arcadia on June 30, 1998 in the Liverpool ECHO newspaper.(Image: British Newspaper Archive/Liverpool ECHO)
“In 1982, he set out for Germany with £500 and returned with 30 pairs of adidas trainers to open a shop in Slater Street – they were snapped up. He realised that Liverpool, with its mixture of football and fashion, was the ideal location for new trends to take off.”
“By the 90s, Wade Smith had expanded to also offer menswear, women’s clothes and even juniorwear. Joined by his brother David and Christopher Lee, who first joined as a sales assistant, the brand continued to develop. The Wade Smith Junior concept also became a reality, with a flagship unit in Paradise Street and others followed in the Meadowhall Centre in Sheffield and in Birkenhead.”
The article continues: “Now that concept is set to spread across Britain. Turnover last year reached more than £17 million and the brand had a national reputation. Not surprisingly, a group like Arcadia was attracted.”
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At the time, Robert Wade Smith said: “I know the chief executive there and we had loosely talked about some sort of joint venture. Eventually he said they did not do that sort of thing and made a bid. It took a few weeks but we decided to say yes.”
In the 90s, Wade Smith leaned further into high fashion and would become something of a celebrity attraction for its imports of high fashion brands like Prada and Gucci, also attracting local footballers.
David and Robert Wade Smith shake hands with Richard Maney (centre) of the Arcadia group(Image: Trinity Mirror/Reach Content Archive)
After changing hands to the Arcadia Group, Robert, who had been retained as chief executive and made around £3 million in Arcadia shares in 1998, bought back the business for £7 million in the early 00s. Wade Smith eventually shut its doors in 2005.
Today, Chris Lee, from Old Swan, co-owns Start-Yard, a creative hub in Birkenhead, with his wife Jill – but in the 80s and 90s he was at the heart of all things Wade Smith. As part of our Liverpool ECHO How It Used To Be series, we previously spoke to Chris about the evolution of the famous Liverpool shop and how fashion has changed in the city through the years.
Liverpool’s Steven Gerrard with Michael Ball of Everton outside Wade Smith sports store Mathew Street with the new adidas predator precision football boots in May 2000(Image: File)
Chris told the ECHO: “I used to go into town every single Saturday looking at all the sports stores and fashion stores trying to get something unique, or different or new. I was handed this leaflet in Church Street and off I went to Slater Street and there was this amazing small shop with tonnes of adidas, the most I’d ever seen and loads of styles I’d never seen before in my life.
“I was made up when that opened and I wanted to ask to work there for a long while in 1982, but I was still at school. I didn’t leave school until 1983.
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“I remember one day I plucked up the courage to ask for a job and a guy called Tony walked in with his bike beat me to it. He lived in the next street to me and I was gutted.”
At the time, Chris started collecting adidas catalogues, writing to different people in other countries to get catalogues from abroad. He used to also go up and down the Southport line to get adidas catalogues from different golf shops.
When he got one in Birkdale featuring golf shoes that weren’t in general distribution, he suggested stocking the shoes to Wade Smith. The store sold hundreds of pairs of them, and from there Chris was offered a job, at first for a week, and later permanently. He worked there for the next 17 years. Chris said: “It was brilliant, every day was a laugh.
Employees Chris Lee and Phil Armorgie outside Wade Smith in Slater Street, Liverpool(Image: Chris Lee)
“It was dead exciting. I’d mentally run to work every day it wasn’t like work it was like living and breathing something you were passionate about.
“There were some great characters working in there. If you weren’t busy you’d be killing yourself laughing. All the customers loved it and on a Saturday in Slater Street we had a separate till that would open and there would be queues there.
“Even all the customers, like I did before I joined, they’d hang around and talk, so you made loads of mates with the customers, and that was just the early days.” Before the days of online shopping and designer fashion brands being so accessible, Wade Smith was a destination to get the latest trends.
In the early days, a pair of fashionable trainers would cost around £30 at Wade Smith. Chris said: “In those days, the sportswear industry hadn’t really taken off.
“Trainer shoes, or trainees as we used to call them, were used for sport and only sports shops sold them, like Jack Sharp. Wade Smith helped moved that over to what they called a more casual scene.
“We had people from around the country coming up. One time five guys from Birmingham came up and all of them bought two pairs each to take home to their mates and Robert Wade Smith gave them £5 back for the petrol on the way back to Birmingham.
“Most of the time, people in those days only got clothes for your birthday, Christmas, or Easter. It’s changed now – there wasn’t even Sunday opening in those days, but you didn’t have a massive wardrobe when you were 16, 17, 18, so you were very careful about what you’d buy.
Chris Lee inside Wade Smith, Slater Street, Liverpool(Image: Chris Lee)
“It was a big investment for someone or someone’s mother to shell out £30 for a pair of trainers in those days.” Expanding from trainers to offer other fashion footwear, womenswear, childrenswear, leisurewear and more, Wade Smith also gravitated towards a new fashion trends with its offer of Nike Air Max and tracksuits.
Through the years, Chris began to travel to trade shows across the UK, Europe and America to find inspiration from popular trends abroad and bring them back to Liverpool. A lot of brands started creating their own concepts with Wade Smith, and Chris said his biggest achievement was designing the interior instore and working on concepts like Wade Smith Junior and Outdoor Athletic.
Chris said: “Everyone I speak to – ex-staff or people who know Wade Smith – nearly on a daily basis all say they miss it. We were never the biggest in the country, but we were always the best and I think people recognise that.
“What made Wade Smith different in the early days was the size of the range we had and the uniqueness of some of the products from Europe that not many other people had. Later, it was about the brand selection, the buying and also the brands we didn’t put in the store that we didn’t deem good enough. That made a difference, we didn’t want to water ourselves down.”