Adidas has been unstoppable over the past few years with successful shoe release after release, but there was a small crack in the fortress recently.
This year marked the 121st Boston Marathon.
Adidas was featured front and center as one of the prime sponsors for the event.
There were 30,074 people who entered the race. With 27,221 people who actually competed in the race, according to the Boston Athletic Association.
Shortly after the event, Adidas sent out an email to everyone who competed.
The subject read: “Congrats, you survived the Boston Marathon!”
The email subject struck a lot of marathoners in the race, as well as multiple Adidas customers, as insensitive, particularly because of the 2013 Boston Marathon attack.
The bombing took place four years ago, killing three and injuring 260. Most took to Twitter after reading the email.
“Dear @adidas, I love you, but you need to talk to whoever is doing your email marketing … ,” wrote @jasonlonsdale.
Others were more understanding of the situation.
“@adidasrunning I know this has good intentions but could really be taken the wrong way,” wrote @WyattGFerrell.
Adidas was swift at issuing another email shortly after the first one caused reaction.
The email subject line had only three words: “We are sorry.”
Along with the headline in the email Adidas apologized further: “We are incredibly sorry. Clearly, there was no thought given to the insensitive email subject line we sent Tuesday. We deeply apologize for our mistake. The Boston Marathon is one of the most inspirational sporting events in the world. Every year we’re reminded of the hope and resiliency of the running community at this event.”