How Two Brothers Created adidas and PUMA

Some of the world’s strongest brands begin with a clear idea. adidas and PUMA began with something even more complicated: a family business, a fractured partnership, and two brothers determined to win in the same arena.

Adolf “Adi” Dassler and Rudolf “Rudi” Dassler started making sports shoes together in Herzogenaurach, Germany. Their early company, the Dassler Brothers Sports Shoe Factory, was formally registered in 1924. What followed was not simply the creation of two athletic-footwear companies—it was the birth of two enduring brand identities built from the same origin but designed to signal very different energies.