Sporting goods store customer experience: 6 examples for 2025

By 2025, the customer experience within physical stores remains a vital component for sports brands. As e-commerce continues its upward trajectory, physical points of sale (POS) are still central in keeping businesses connected with customers through emotional engagement and loyalty building. Each interaction should be crafted to enhance consumer value.

This article examines six instances where sporting goods retail companies have excelled in creating remarkable customer experiences in 2025.

6 examples of successful customer experiences in 2025

Sport 2000: fostering loyalty through sporting engagement

Sport 2000 has implemented several initiatives from its digital transformation agenda with the goal of enhancing the customer journey. The innovative Sport Booklet rewards customers for engaging in physical activities, thereby strengthening the connection with the brand. This program complements the existing loyalty card, promoting sports practice while delivering financial perks.

Customers can freely enroll in the loyalty program, which tracks their activity and assigns a score. The Sport Booklet offers challenges, expert advice, communications, and VIP experiences, with feedback continuously improving the program.

JD Sports: same-day click & collect

JD Sports has introduced a rapid customer service experience with its same-day click and collect feature, catering to the demand for immediacy prevalent among consumers in 2025.

Customers placing orders online before 2 PM can pick up their items from the store on the same day, free of additional charges. This well-received service in customer reviews illustrates the desired flexibility and speed, reinforcing JD Sports’ strong omnichannel presence.

Decathlon: leveraging RFID & self-checkout

Decathlon has adapted to the changing digital landscape by utilizing a web-to-store strategy to significantly improve the customer experience:

• Mobistore: a seller application linked to a database, streamlining customer interactions and sales.
• RFID: chips embedded in each product, deployed extensively since 2014, ensuring product traceability, fast checkouts, and confirmed availability.
• Self-checkout: customers no longer need to individually scan items; purchases are recognized collectively at the self-checkout terminal, slashing checkout time by over 50%.
• Mobile checkout: since April 2025, more than 300 French stores feature mobile checkout systems for sales associates, in collaboration with Orisha Commerce. Objectives include excellent customer-sales team interaction, seamless payment processes, shorter queues, and enhanced customer identification.
  
  

RFID generates high-quality data regarding store flows, aiding in inventory optimization and minimizing stockouts.

Decathlon City: enhancing proximity & sales associate mobility

The French retailer recognizes the importance of customer interactions and closeness. The Decathlon City format is specifically created to foster the relationship between customers and sales associates through various strategies, such as hiring coaching sales associates and implementing mobile checkout systems.

Decathlon City stands out due to its compact design, aimed at blending into the busy shopping districts of urban centers.

Nike: delivering a personalized experience

Nike has crafted an immersive shopping experience to ensure superior customer satisfaction. The “House of Innovation” concept store provides a fully personalized journey for each customer.
The shopping experience is enriched by:

• Mission Control at the entrance, linking customers to Nike’s global sports community.
• The Kids Pod, a dedicated area for children featuring appropriate products and games.

Nike also offers “Nike By You,” a personalization space where customers can customize their shoes and apparel with various colors and features. This service turns each interaction into a unique customer experience, boosting satisfaction.
These personalized offerings are powered by in-store data collection and analysis, which helps customize recommendations, communications, and promotions.

Intersport: optimizing through OMS & e-reservation

The sixth standout example of customer experience: Intersport has prominently invested in unifying its sales channels to streamline the shopping experience. Since 2019, the company has utilized OMS One Stock to consolidate its inventory.This strategy has enabled the roll-out of several customer-friendly services:

• E-reservation: lets customers reserve products online and collect them in-store without committing to a purchase beforehand.
• Click and collect: online orders with free in-store pickup, frequently available the following day.
• Ship from store: leveraging stores as mini-warehouses to expedite product delivery to customers.                                         
  For shoppers, this translates to easy access to the complete catalog, avoiding the hassle of transporting bulky items, and enjoying a fluid shopping experience.

In 2025, the customer experience is the foremost differentiator in sporting goods retail.

It is essential to establish a consistent experience across all sales channels. The examples reviewed demonstrate that successful customer experiences hinge on five key pillars:

• Active customer loyalty;

• Smooth digitalization processes to cut down wait times and boost consumer satisfaction;

• Close customer engagement through dedicated sales associates;

• Experiential innovation to craft memorable moments;
• Omnichannel strategies with well-coordinated multichannel inventory.