Fylde coast brothers' backpack business aims for £4m sales target

Nick and Danny Costello’s Built for Athletes said it saw record sales of more than half a million during the month of November, with the brand experiencing a rise of 139 per cent in sales year on year during Black Friday weekend.

The gym backpack team are on track to post sales of £4M for this financial year ending March 2021, a £2M increase on last year’s figures.

The brand, built from the frustration of being unable to find a suitable backpack to hold gym equipment supports more than 60,000 fitness fanatics globally and that number continued to grow during the pandemic despite the widespread closure of gyms across most markets.

This growth has given Built for Athletes confidence moving forward and the brand has launched a new duffle bag, made from tough waterproof fabric, with a 35L capacity and which includes features such as a dedicated footwear compartment.

Built For Athletes was founded in 2018 by chief executive Nick Costello, serial entrepreneur and CrossFit enthusiast, who has attributed the growth down to a surge in popularity across both Europe and the US, with the US market now accounting for more than 25 per cent of total sales.

Nick said: “Black Friday weekend was a huge success for us, a 139 per cent increase in sales is something we’re immensely proud of and is testament to the strength of the brand. Black Friday is our only sale each year. Our loyal customers were aware of this and headed over to the website in huge numbers as soon as the sale went live.

“The fantastic sales means that we’re on track to post sales of £4M for this financial year, not only that but our product design team have some exciting new products to launch.”

Danny Costello, marketing director of Built For Athletes, said: “We continue to invest heavily in technology to improve the customer experience and content creation to resonate with the fitness community and stay relevant.

“The strength of sales performance for Q4 2020 gives us a great springboard to support even more athletes attain their fitness goals in 2021.”

He said the original products from Built for Athletes, the Hero Backpack and Hero 2.0 Backpack, were key to the recent success and have won numerous awards.

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