During a year of postponed sports seasons and events for Gen Z, Eastbay and Champs used video content to engage with young sports players.

During a year of postponed sports seasons and events for Gen Z, Eastbay and Champs used video content to engage with young sports players. According to a report from McKinsey & Company and the World Federation Sporting Goods Industry, the total number of hours kids spent playing sports decreased nearly 50% during COVID-19. YPulse’s Scouting Next Gen Sports Fans research found that 78% of Gen Z plays some kind of sport, and when the pandemic put their activities on pause, Eastbay and Champs turned to YouTube to keep the young sports community connected. With a YouTube subscriber base of 134K, Champs aligned its strategy across eight different content series featuring product- and fashion-focused content with Refresh Your Game and Illustrated, and also produced sports content like Fouled Out. Eastbay, which has 71K subscribers, focused more on high school athletes and performance in its content series featuring Conqher (stories about female athletes), Clocking In (highlights about what professional athletes do to excel), and Dual Threat (stories of high school athletes who play two sports). (Retail Dive)