Prada names basketball player Yang Shuyu as new brand ambassador in China

Luxury fashion brand Prada has named Chinese basketball player, Yang Shuyu as its latest brand ambassador in China. Yang is a basketball player for the Inner Mongolia women’s basketball team, she helped China secure a bronze medal at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics in the women’s 3x3 basketball tournament.

The appointment comes after the brand appointed Ma Long, Chinese table tennis player as its brand ambassador last year, showing the brand’s new attempt to engage athletes to be the face of the brand and its shift in strategy towards sports celebrities.

According to Prada’s Weibo page, Yang was chosen for her unwavering desire to constantly breakthrough boundaries and her relentless drive to embrace different possibilities for herself, which perfectly captures the brand essence.

Yang’s appeal extends beyond her sports abilities. Yang's androgynous style has struck a chord with a broad demographic, allowing her to carve out a niche in a market that values both aesthetic diversity and gender neutrality, according to the brand.

As part of the announcement, a video titled “Play it Like Her” was launched showing Yang’s multi-faced character from various aspects of her life, such as sports, diet, and music. Taglines “be sporty like her”, “eat healthy like her”, “enjoy music like her” take turn to appear in the video. Audiences are able to see different faces of Yang wearing various Prada outfits that represents her essence. A check by MARKETING-INTERACTIVE saw the video garnered over 24,000 views, with netizens praising Yang’s charm.

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Prada also had Yang takeover its Xiaohongshu account for five days in order to create more buzz for the campaign. Each day, Yang would appear in a post with a short description of what she does on the day, the first day was “basketball day”, a series of photos of Yang playing basketball were posted, inviting people to see firsthand how she trains. The post is followed by a few other posts themed “intermission”, “what to eat”, and “playlists”.

Yang also took to her Weibo page that boasts 3 million followers to make the announcement. With her appointment as Prada’s global ambassador, she will be joining the likes of singer Cai Xukun, athlete Ma Long, actor Li Xian, actress Chun Xia, to name a few.

MARKETING-INTERACTIVE has reached out to Prada China for more information.

Last year, Prada launched a campaign featuring tiger, the Zodiac animal. Titled, "Action in the Year of The Tiger", Prada has announced that the campaign would be combined with an art project, aiming to safeguard this animal. According to Prada, the art project invites creative talents who are aged 30 and below in art schools in China (and beyond) to present a personal interpretation of the tiger.  The interpretation can come in the form of a painting, design, or a sculpture. The luxury fashion house will also be making a donation to the China Green Foundation's, "Walking With Tiger and Leopard” programme to drum up awareness for the wildlife and biodiversity in China. 

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