Dive Brief:

• In a potential further challenge to Victoria's Secret, ThirdLove on Wednesday announced that it has entered into the activewear category, according to a company press release. 
• The launch features three collections: The Kinetic Collection, The Flex Collection and The Muse Collection, which are high, medium and low impact, respectively. 
• The foundation piece of the category is the company's Kinetic Impact Sports Bra, which underwent two years of research and development, and was based on the brand's Classic T-Shirt Bra. Price points for the entire sports bra category range from $45 to $70. 

Dive Insight:

"Are you ready to get moving?" ThirdLove's website asks as an introduction to its new activewear category. 

The term "sports bra" is the most searched term on the ThirdLove website. That, and the fact that the global women's activewear market is forecast to reach a value of nearly $217 billion by 2025, according to the company, led the DTC brand to see an opportunity in product expansion. It also led to the development of the Kinetic Impact Sports Bra that features cup and band sizing versus the usual small, medium and large size designation for products. 

"We have heard our customer's rallying cry for ThirdLove to create sports bras and activewear that solves their fit issues, and we know there's still a huge white space in the active market," Heidi Zak, co-founder and CEO of ThirdLove, said in a statement. 

The company has been emphasizing fit and comfort, specifically through a recent brand revamp that included "a new verbal identity, visual system, and art direction," and a new logo. "In our world, uncomfortable is unacceptable! We want all women to have the feeling of confidence that comes with comfort, with things that make you feel good, starting with ThirdLove," Zak said in a statement at the time of the announcement. 

In the past, Zak has been critical of rival Victoria's Secret's sexualized, male-focused marketing, and the company went as far as to publish an ad in The New York Times to state that ThirdLove is "the antithesis of Victoria's Secret." 

But, it's not just Victoria's Secret that is a competitor in the crowded activewear market. Since the start of the year, fellow DTC company Thinx expanded into the category, as did Allbirds. J.C. Penney also revamped its activewear private brand, and Wolverine World Wide acquired activewear company Sweaty Betty as a means to enhance the company's DTC strategy. At the start of the year, Target announced that it achieved the company's goal of generating $1 billion in its first year of launching its All in Motion private label. And Lululemon said in its latest earnings that it expects to surpass its 2023 revenue goal by the end of this year.