Salomon Teams With The Woolmark Company to Update Its Pulsar PRG Sneaker
Salomon has updated its Pulsar PRG Knit shoe for winter.
To make this happen, the outdoor sports brand teamed with The Woolmark Company on a new take on the popular sneaker style featuring a knitted upper made of 30 percent merino wool.
According to The Woolmark Company, the use of merino wool offers the wearer thermoregulation, moisture management and breathability properties, while also allowing the footwear company to reduce its reliance on synthetic materials.
The organization added its collaborative shoe underwent “rigorous testing” for durability, performance, Merino wool fiber content and exacting quality standards to receive Woolmark certification, signified by the Wool Blend Performance logo.
John Roberts, managing director at The Woolmark Company, said in a statement that he is “pleased” that Salomon has incorporated merino wool into its Sportstyle range for the first time. “Merino wool’s inherent performance benefits and environmental benefits have been driving new opportunities for the fiber in the footwear market, and Salomon’s new Pulsar PRG Knit with a merino wool upper is a fantastic example of innovation and product development.”
This isn’t the first time the two companies have worked together. Late last year, The Woolmark Company and Salomon teamed up to decide the winners of the 2022 Woolmark Performance Challenge. For last year’s challenge, participants had to explore apparel next generation head-to-toe running kits for long-distance mountain runners, focusing on the use of durable bio fibers, including merino.
“The ambition of all the young talents participating in the WPC has reinforced Salomon’s teams’ conviction of the emergency to find sustainable solutions for the world global textile production,” Florian Traullé, R&D footwear manager at Salomon, said at the time.
In recent years, Salomon has gained the love of the fashion world, reaching a fever pitch earlier this year when Rihanna wore the MM6 Maison Margiela x Salomon Cross Low sneakers during her performance at the Super Bowl. The moment undoubtedly led the shoe to make the top 10 hottest products for Q1 2023 on the Lyst Index earlier this year.
Other recent collaborations, like with Sandy Liang, have also been popular with the fashion elite.
But Salomon was hot well before that buzzy halftime show. According to StockX, Salomon was the fastest-growing sneaker brand on the marketplace, experiencing 2,277 percent trade growth in 2022 over 2021.