All insights Brand strategy 6 min read

Translated from the Vietnamese original

Adidas’s Tang Jacket, a mandarin-collar jacket for China, illustrates a crucial principle: culture only creates commercial value when it is translated into contemporary demand.

The real question is not “is there culture?” but “does that culture create a reason to buy?”

For many brands, a “heritage product” means red, traditional patterns, a long history and a layer of symbolism. That approach creates recognition easily, but not necessarily demand.

Adidas went another way. It saw a major shift in how young Chinese consumers behave: sportswear is no longer just for sport. It has become a way to express identity, something people wear to signal their taste, cultural confidence and local roots.

That is why the Tang Jacket was not designed as festive wear. Instead of getting stuck in the formula of red and New Year symbols, it uses black, tonal patterns and a far more wearable look. It was made to be part of everyday life.

How Adidas turned heritage into a product that sells

Adidas did not put a traditional outfit on the market as it was. It translated cultural symbols into the language of streetwear and sportswear.

The recognizable details, the standing collar, knotted buttons and tonal patterns, were kept. But the whole product was anchored in a more modern form: a relaxed fit, flexible fabric, the three stripes, a small Trefoil logo, and a palette far easier to wear than older interpretations of heritage.

As a result, the product doesn’t make the wearer feel they are “performing” culture. It gives them a way to wear culture more naturally and flexibly, in more settings.

This is the core point: customers don’t buy heritage in its original form; they buy a version translated into their own lives.

Premium comes not from the story, but from feeling worth owning

A good story doesn’t automatically create a high price. To sell at a premium, a brand has to create three things:

1. 1. The desire to own
2. 2. A sense of scarcity
3. 3. Confidence that the value won’t be destroyed after purchase

Adidas positioned the Tang Jacket as accessible premium: high enough to keep its symbolic value, yet within reach of the urban middle class. More importantly, the product wasn’t dragged down by blanket discounting. That protects the feeling of “paying the right price” and keeps the symbol from being commoditized too quickly.

Premium here is not just the price. It is the feeling that something is worth keeping, worth wearing, and worth showing off, subtly.

Local execution is the real advantage

A good insight from global headquarters isn’t fast enough for a market that moves as quickly as China. Adidas solved this by empowering its local design team, notably its Shanghai Creative Center.

What matters is not simply “having a local team,” but that the team is directly involved in design, product development, material selection, fit and speed to launch. Then the strategy is no longer Made in China in the manufacturing sense, but Made for China in the creative sense.

In highly local markets, winning doesn’t come from researching customers a little better. It comes from moving decision-making closer to the customer.

The biggest risk: a symbol used too much

When a cultural product becomes a trend, it also becomes easy to wear out. The more it is shared, copied and seen everywhere, the faster it loses its distinctiveness.

The Tang Jacket shows a familiar pattern: knock-offs, overly fast coverage and viral spread on social media can turn a premium symbol into something seen as “overdone.” The brand then faces not only price competition, but a decline in the feeling of ownership.

So cultural strategy is not only about creating an attractive product. It is about managing the life cycle of a symbol: which versions to keep scarce, which can be extended, and when to refresh before the market is saturated.

What this means for Vietnamese businesses

The lesson from Adidas is not “do more culture.” It is: translate culture into a reason to buy.

A Vietnamese tea brand cannot position itself as premium just by talking about the age of its tea trees, its growing region or its tea-making tradition. It has to answer: on what occasions do customers use it, who do they give it to, what does it replace, and why is it a more refined gift than other premium options?

A modest-wear fashion brand doesn’t win because it carries cultural or religious symbols either. It wins when it turns those values into products with a good cut, good fabric, real practicality and a fit with everyday life.

Heritage products only have commercial value when they help customers become the version of themselves they want to be today.

Culture is the raw material. Contemporary demand is the market.

In short: don’t sell culture as a lesson. Turn it into a way customers live, dress, use, give and express themselves today.