In the beginning of 2024, we entered into new territory – adding Training as a vertical. Together with creative partner FKA twigs, we launched into a new movement category, starting with the development of our first shoe designed for the gym, the Cloudpulse. Fast forward to THE BODY IS ART, together with twigs, this concept serves as the baseline for how we’ve shown up with our training collections in the first year – blending movement, art, and self-expression and celebrating all forms of movement.
Go behind the scenes with our team and get a glimpse of what goes into building this new vertical, from creative to product and digital.
Tell us about the journey of launching training.
Indi Adams, Director of Product Vertical Training:
We work with athletes performing at the highest level and one conversation really stood out: 99% of gold medals are forged in countless hours of dedication before the race – much of this relentless grind is in gyms and studios. This realization crystallized our thinking. While our existing categories celebrated movement in their own right, we recognized a crucial missing piece: training.
"Training" is a vast landscape, encompassing a myriad of modalities. We knew we needed a focused starting point. Mobility quickly emerged as a key theme. It's the bedrock of injury prevention, enhances performance across disciplines, and is crucial for recovery. This insight shaped the foundation of our apparel range, prioritizing flexibility, range of motion, and support.
On the footwear front, we were drawn to a form of training that resonated deeply with our running heritage: High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). We envisioned a shoe that could handle the explosive sprints of a treadmill workout, yet provide the stability needed for resistance training with high reps and moderate to low weights. This vision led us to reimagine the Cloud X 4, evolving it into an even more versatile training companion. And from this evolution, a sibling was born: the Cloudpulse. These two shoes represent the initial heartbeat of our training category, a commitment to supporting athletes in those crucial hours of preparation, the foundation upon which champions are built. This is just the beginning, and we're incredibly excited to see where this journey takes us.
What’s the design language for On’s training apparel?
Nina Riedl, Apparel Design Senior Lead:
On's training apparel design language is a fusion of performance innovation and effortless comfort. The brand seamlessly integrates hidden technology, ensuring peak functionality without visual clutter so people can feel their best while moving. Innovative, moisture-wicking fabrics keeping wearers dry through both lower-intensity sessions like yoga and Pilates and higher-intensity workouts like HIIT.
The Studio collection is defined by buttery-soft materials that drape effortlessly, moving in sync with the body while maintaining a premium, weightless feel. Body-hugging fits enhance mobility and precision, creating a second-skin sensation that offers unrestricted support. A focus on thoughtful design details and minimal branding elevates the aesthetic. Every piece is crafted to empower movement, where comfort meets cutting-edge performance.
In the Train collection, bold, technical innovation meets high-performance design, built to support sweatier, more intense workouts. A striking contrast of comfort and sharp, moisture-wicking fabrics merges with innovative yarns to actively support wearers during movement. Hidden technology is embedded in every detail, carefully engineered to enhance performance with a purposefully considered design.
The Focus collection is designed for low-impact workouts while seamlessly transitioning into everyday wear. A balance of technical yet discreet details, classic silhouettes, and understated but thoughtfully engineered elements ensures both style and function – technical without being overcomplicated.
How did we combine our creative vision together with FKA twigs to bring the category to life?
Michaela Hardy, Head of Entertainment Marketing, and Pauline Terán Rawisch, Marketing Campaigns Lead:
What’s so special about partnerships is coming together to create something that each side couldn’t create without the other. FKA twigs is long known as a creative force. Knowing this, we entered the partnership eager to learn about her view on training – what that means to her community and the execution of her music and movement. These insights led to a unique and powerful take on training. It pushed the brand into new spheres. THE BODY IS ART is a result of creative forces coming together to challenge the rules and redefine what training can look like for all movers.
Can you talk us through the message of THE BODY IS ART and how we celebrate movement through training?
Caroline Slawson, Senior Specialist – Marketing Strategist:
When entering the training space, we knew it was competitive and crowded. We also knew we didn’t want to show up like everyone else. And through extensive research from focus groups and surveys, we found that consumers were looking for something different too. The training community has evolved so much over the past four years and brands haven’t necessarily been evolving with them.
The training community is training for holistic health, which means any single training session will probably look different than the day before. They’re changing things up to keep motivated, have fun and of course to build mental and physical strength – which can look different for everyone. Our products speak to this consumer through both performance versatility and design for self-expression. They want to stand out and represent this new wave of training. This is why THE BODY IS ART and the partnership with FKA twigs perfectly reflected the evolving values of this community and their deeper connection to training.
How was the process of building our creative vision from scratch?
Jonatan O. Akay, Head of Group Creative:
As a Swiss brand, exploration sits close to our hearts, so when we realized that there is a community out there that sees training as an explorative exercise, our approach felt very clear. We want to enable people to explore places, communities, strengths, weaknesses and ultimately, how to grow through training.
Gabriel Stokes, Creative Senior Lead:
Collaborating with FKA twigs was the perfect opportunity for us to establish ourselves in the training space in a bold, unique way that resonated with our community – curious explorers who seek to stand out and train not just for the physical benefits but see it as a journey for the mind and soul.
Constantly evolving, FKA twigs doesn’t define herself by one form of training but inspires our communities with unique and creative ways to move. Through her lens of THE BODY IS ART, we wanted to show how training can be an empowering art form, a means of self-expression and a celebration of the beauty of strength and movement in all its forms. This ethos is brought to life through a series of seasonal campaigns featuring disruptive images, films and IRL events and activations.
How do we go about creating a visual representation of the unique aspects of our training products?
Jiani Gomes, Art Director:
Training is, above all, an exploration of one’s own body. Building it, for various reasons, is the result of personal reflection that visually expresses itself through posture, muscle shape, volume, new movement, a particular aesthetic, energy and emotions.
Each part of the body then becomes a reflection of a story, which the mover evolves according to what they wish to reveal about themselves. Furthermore, each body becomes a point of contact with the training community, fostering connections where individuals can share support, encourage one another and evolve together, creating a collective journey of growth and transformation.
How do we go about presenting the product to intrigue our customers and introduce On as a training brand?
Pia-Maria Laux, Senior Lead - Apparel & Accessories Merchandising:
A product alone doesn’t create brand loyalty – the experience does. To establish On as a training brand, we know we need to create moments that allow customers to feel the product’s impact first-hand. This shows in different ways –
- With community and athlete involvement: Training is inherently social. By integrating real athletes, trainers and fitness communities into our brand narrative, we show that On is more than a product.
- With digital storytelling: Immersive content, interactive product launches, and behind-the-scenes insights engage customers as they explore the collection.
- With our retail spaces: In-store experiences, training workshops, and live sessions with athletes allow customers to test, feel, and trust the gear in action.
- With a curated experience for our fans: Creating a designated space for On’s training apparel – both in retail stores and online – reinforces our commitment to the training category and enhances the customer’s shopping experience.
- With our ambassadors: Leveraging our community of On ambassadors ensures that our products resonate authentically with our audiences. The FKA twigs campaign was a breakthrough success, demonstrating the power of creative storytelling in connecting with a broader audience. By merging performance with cultural relevance, the campaign captivated consumers and positioned On apparel as both functional and expressive.
- By elevating our apparel: Training demands apparel that moves with the body while providing support and breathability. Our three lines – Studio, Train and Focus – create a 360˚ offer that fully supports the training lifestyle, allowing athletes to move seamlessly between disciplines.
Training is evolving, and so is On. By blending innovation, community and experience, we don’t just sell products – we inspire movement.
How do we translate this training narrative into our spaces?
Rebecca Loaiza, Trade Campaign Design Senior Specialist and Willem Tauveron, Campaigns Design Specialist:
The human body, especially in the context of movement and training, possesses a sculptural quality. Our vision was to reflect this by creating something both sculptural and brutalist, reinforcing the idea that the body itself is art. We designed figurative sculptures to hold various products and lighting, transforming these elements into striking figures that appear to present the items themselves.
This concept embraces an artistic and raw interpretation of the campaign, juxtaposing industrial scaffolding with refined product displays. Through bold, unconventional forms and layered silhouettes of dancers in motion, we construct a central totem – brought to life with minimalist product placement, industrial lighting, and exposed wiring.
What goes into preparing the digital roll-out for a big launch to ensure we deliver the best experience for our customers? How do you determine its success?
Marie Vogel, Digital Campaigns Senior Specialist:
Months in advance of a big launch, we plan the journey and consumer experience, define the different deliverables and ownership, and map out all touchpoints – across the entire process, we constantly align, refine and reshape. In the weeks approaching the launch, we work through our creative development and materials which can last until the last few sprints.
As we get closer to the go-live, we revisit every single aspect of the campaign and truly test the journey by checking and monitoring forecast and inventory levels; mocking up all touchpoints and ensuring the entire team is aligned to sign off and informing our Happiness Delivery team about potential questions. And when the campaign goes live, the team is connected, either physically or virtually to ensure we can track what’s happening and be reactive if needed. It requires a village as they say, and we do it as a team.
When we say touchpoints, we mean all digital consumer touchpoints from owned digital channels like our website and app, to email, paid media channels, affiliate channels, but also paid and organic search. We also connect closely with our channel team to map out how consumers land on the campaign on on.com – considering also some unusual touchpoints like the App Store (if you’re downloading the On app), or through content some of our partners produce, like podcasts.
As for measuring success, once a campaign launches, the team tracks the goals and targets we initially defined for the different channels on a 2-day, 7-day and 14-day basis, and then continuously from there. For some campaigns, we track the different elements even more often to ensure we have a smooth and seamless experience.
How do we work with our retail partners to introduce training beyond our stores and on.com?
Sarah Bennett, Director of Key Accounts:
Our Training category has a connective thread across our entire product line, embodying our mission to ignite the human spirit through movement – whether it’s dedicated runners chasing PRs or fitness enthusiasts striving for overall well-being. From the start, we knew this launch had to reach multiple communities in a meaningful way, and our trusted wholesale partners played a pivotal role in bringing this vision to life.
Taking the U.S. market as an example, we focused on a few key consumer groups and strove for authenticity. That led us to partner with Equinox, DSG, Nordstrom and Free People Movement – retailers with deep influence in these spaces. With these partners, we deployed multi-channel strategies that included digital homepage take-overs, social influencer campaigns (generating over 3 million impressions), six movement sessions bringing together over 400 fitness enthusiasts and in-store trade enhancements in all 94 Nordstrom locations.
While our Training category launched beyond these three retailers, our most impactful work was focused on those with the greatest influence on our core consumers. Establishing close relationships with our partners, no matter the market we're working on, and making sure we're deliberate and strategic when approaching them is always key to successfully broadening our reach, especially when launching a new category.
