Thread by @secondserves, Sergio Tacchini and the fashion revolution in tennis! Let’s go deep into [...]

Sergio Tacchini and the fashion revolution in tennis!

Let’s go deep into the fashion in tennis and find out a bit more about this clothing brand that dominated the tennis world in the 80’s!

Even if not all of us think so, fashion is a big part of tennis. The outfits of top players today is, in general, well though and designed to be a marketing piece itself.
This starts (or at least becomes big) with Sergio Tacchini and his new clothing brand called Tacchini.

The brand would become HUGE when Jimmy Connors jumped in and decided to wear it on his matches. Then, everyone followed through, of course.

John McEnroe being one.
Even from the beginning, you could see a trademark on Tacchini’s clothes, especially the presence of stripes.
Sergio’s intention was to kill the “all white” uniforms in tennis, to bring a little spice into fashion

By the 90’s the brand was worldwide and had many top players wearing it, like Hingis and Sampras

But with fame comes trouble. Martina Hingis filed a lawsuit against the company claiming she withdrew from many tournaments due to injury caused by their shoes! This would have been from 96-99 and actually her doctor told her that she needed to get new shoes. The company ignored

The lawsuit was very harmful to the company even though they didn’t pay the whole 40 million dollars amount she filed for.

The company continued without Hingis, who was dropped as a spokeswoman! But by now it had seen brighter days and the company was going under, until in 2008 a Hong Kong company bought Tacchini and kept it alive! Now, it was time for a next step and a major investment

In 2001 Tacchini was famous on center court, when Goran Ivanišević wins Wimbledon as a Wild card!

By 2010, the company decided to invest in aspiring players like Rochus, Robredo and 2008 AO champion Novak Djokovic!
The deal saw Tacchini sponsoring a top player for the first time in a few years!

The Djokovic investment was a gift from the gods for Tacchini, as by 2011 Djokovic had an unbelievable season, reaching #1 in the world and winning 3 major titles. Tacchini was at the top of the world once again!

Every characteristic was still there, with the striped polo shirt dominating Novak’s wardrobe! But with him they went a little different, putting details like wings and dragons on its back

But what was at first a gift became a nightmare. Djokovic’s winning proves to backfire as the company by contract was supposed to pay bonus to him as he kept on winning. The company couldn’t sustain its own contract. The partnership was beough to an end in 2012

The brand still exists and sells both regular and sports clothes and is still on the tennis world with players like Muller, Rochus and Strycova!
Still, to a brand that was as big as Tacchini was it can be seen as a disappointment!