How FP Movement’s early bet on tennis popularity paid off

A deep dive into the activewear brand's 360-degree strategy for tennis category success with its managing director of brand marketing.

Welcome to the first Kitted Deep Dive — a longer format of my Kitted series in which I go deep on the fashion brands making waves in tennis right now. Come for the business insights, stay for execs keeping it real.

FP Movement Athlete Sloane Stephens

In 2021, amid a global pandemic that saw people living full-time in athleisure and workout wear, FP Movement—the athletic sub-brand of Free People—was gifted with its own marketing budget for the first time, nine years after its launch. “The brand had exploded,” said Courtney Weis, the managing director of FP Movement Brand Marketing. When the team sat down to define which categories they wanted to put that money towards, it was running, hiking, and mat (e.g. yoga and pilates) they bet on first. But as more people started to prioritize getting outside (finally!) to re-engage with their communities, it became apparent fast that racquet was a must.

What started with one product—a performance skirt—has grown to 106, with most offered in a host of colorways (at times up to 28). And unlike other brands who simply added a mid-pandemic racquet line to stay in vogue with the pickleball craze, the FP Movement team was determined to go deep with tennis.

Weis had the foresight to sign Sofia Kenin, now the world No. 26, in 2022 when she was ranked outside the top 200. “We had just opened our FP Movement store in Miami, where Sofia lives,” said Weis. “She was loving the brand naturally and we got connected to her agents over at GSE and just dove right in.” She was the brand’s first sponsored athlete; former US Open champ Sloane Stephens and world No. 68 Danielle Collins would follow suit in the next few years.

And when its players show up on the grounds of a tournament, the brand often pops up there, too. FP Movement has held regular activations in and around every Grand Slam except the Australian Open, as well as many of the Masters 1000 tournaments like Indian Wells and smaller 500s like the Charleston Open.

Showing up (and on players) has paid off: during the height of tennis activity in the summer of 2024, FP Movement’s tennis category saw triple-digit growth in sales from June to August. It also outpaced sales and traffic growth of its most popular categories like run and mat during last year’s US Open, with tennis product page views jumping 189% during the Slam’s two week period. Similar numbers are expected this year, when the brand had its largest presence at the event yet.

“Like anything in marketing, it’s been a little bit of a magic and a lot of strategy behind the scenes,” said Weis of the brand’s success. “We’ve been trying to attack the sport from every level, whether that’s experiential, talent, sponsorships, or hosting.”

The timing couldn’t be more ideal. US tennis participation surged to a high of 25.7 million players this year, following five years of consistent growth, according to the USTA. While certain brands are playing catch up, FP Movement got in just before tennis popularity really exploded and Grand Slams were on the cusp of turning into Coachella-like events, giving them deeper ties to the tennis community and a better understanding of what works well while the iron is extremely hot.

Below, I break down FP Movement’s multi-pronged strategy to make it a brand you immediately associate with tennis (with some fun “inside baseball” nuggets along the way).

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Athlete marketing

FP Movement Athlete Sofia Kenin

After signing Kenin in 2022, Weis and her team were given access to all of the tennis tournaments (except, for some reason, the French Open, she noted with a laugh). The result was getting up close and personal with the way the tennis world runs, and, crucially, facetime with other players who could be a good brand fit. “You get to see players in their off-court looks, their demeanor, and how they act,” explained Weis.

She met Sloane Stephens (who won the US Open in 2017) at Indian Wells that year and they immediately clicked, with Weis describing her as “so friendly, enthusiastic, and a true businesswoman.” Stephens, who wasn’t aware of FP Movement’s tennis ambitions at the time, casually mentioned how much she loved the brand. It was good timing—her contract with Nike was up soon and, after Weis and her team connected with her agents, Stephens jumped to FP Movement in 2023. “Sloane was our first big breakout in that we really featured her in our campaigns and started making custom product for her,” said Weis. (All of the brand’s athletes now wear custom product.)

Then in May of 2024, they signed Danielle Collins, who had been playing without a sponsor since her New Balance contract ended in 2021 and would often unofficially wear brands like Alo Yoga on court. “We picked her up halfway through the season because she was wearing our product organically, which is always such a compliment,” said Weis.

Both Stephens and Collins have struggled with injuries and health issues this year, but even when they’re not on court they can be seen wearing (and posting about wearing) their FP Movement gear.

Filling a design void

Brands that enter the tennis category tend to default to the country club look but FP Movement is targeting a woman who leans into feminine details and wants to stand out more on court. While there are some classic elements (like a bra and skirt set with varsity stripes) most of the designs lean very girly, often with an unusual twist, like a smocked tank with a ruffled bottom, a bubble skort, or a billowy tennis dress with a built-in ruched bra that peeks out. It’s for a very particular type of girl, and although I’m not the target market, I can appreciate that they’re delivering something funkier than what’s been on offer and that appeals to a large subset of women.

“We have an incredible design and sourcing team and the number one emphasis is the intersection of fashion and function,” said Weis.

FP Movement Tennis Wear

The fashion part gets extra tricky when working with the athlete ambassadors, when function matters more than ever, said Weis. That was a learning curve for the design team. “There was a lot of education with the designers about regulation lengths and things as simple as where the ball pockets go, or if the player even wants ball pockets, because some people just like to tuck it into their shorts—all of those little nuances,” said Weis.

As such, many of the match fits are more basic, even if they are custom, like a ribbed coral cross-back dress or a cropped white top with a navy athletic-stripe skort.

One setback to the custom fits is that the price point is often too high to sell to consumers. As Weis strategizes for 2026, she’s exploring ways to change that—ensuring that all custom looks can be sold (ideally at the same time the player is wearing them on court) and potentially forgoing them if they can’t. “The Free People brand is so design-led and then marketing kind of fits into that, so I’m trying to help reverse that a little bit,” she says.

Targeted influencer partnerships

FP Movement has a large influencer program to begin with, and for the tennis category they’ve honed in on partnerships with popular tennis WAGs like Morgan Riddle, Ayan Broomfield, and Paige Lorenze, as well as smaller tennis-adjacent influencers like Madison Appel and Jordaan Ashley.

“When you start to go to the tournaments, you get to really see who’s a personality fit, who’s genuine, who already likes the brand, who is working out on their own—not just by playing tennis, but who’s going to studio classes or has an actual need in their everyday life for active wear and would make sense to promote it,” said Weis.

Riddle, the brand’s most consistent tennis influencer partner to date, was a natural fit—she posts travel vlogs from every tournament she attends with her boyfriend and world No. 5 Taylor Fritz, in which a common theme is the workout classes she loves most in every city. “She’s a strong storyteller and as a brand marketer, that’s exactly what you want,” said Weis.

Morgan Riddle in FP Movement

During this year’s US Open, Riddle held a mat-based class for her followers at the workout studio in Free People’s Soho store that she was adamant about making free, which charmed Weis. FP Movement gifted all of the attendees and it was a hit.

All of the brand’s influencer partnerships in this space start off with gifting to see if it’s a good fit, but tested veterans like Riddle are paid. “We’ve always found that if you want certain deliverables, if you want certain tags or products called out, and you want it guaranteed to go live on a certain date then you do need to pay,” said Weis. “It’s their livelihood and it’s a job at the end of the day.”

And it’s not always the same three tennis WAGs you’re most used to seeing in these contexts that FP Movement works with. In a bit of creative genius (and a gift to true tennis fans), the brand featured Daria Medvedeva, wife of the one and only Daniil Medvedev, in a campaign for its sneaker collaboration with Lacoste, which launched in May. (For context, her husband is sponsored by Lacoste.) As Medvedeva continues to dip her toes in the influencer pond, FP Movement will be along for the ride.

Lacoste x FP Movement Sneakers

Like many brands, they also host VIPs at Grand Slams with suites and regular tickets, including at Wimbledon and the US Open this year. Not only does that create goodwill with the invitees, it can also result in significant brand exposure. Well, unless the tournament wants to rain on your parade. The FP Movement team discovered this August that the US Open won’t let you or any attendees post about your (in this case $40,000) VIP suite if you’re not an official sponsor of the tournament, a head-scratcher of a rule that led to the brand getting a cease and desist. Next year, tickets may be a better option, joked Weis. (A quick note from me to the tournament: please let non-sponsor brands post about their suites, we don’t need tickets getting even more expensive.)

Community events

Perhaps one of the most integral parts of FP Movement’s strategy, though, is its emphasis on creating community around tennis. “There’s this momentum and this community when you play tennis, it becomes such a family and something that you’re all so enthusiastic about,” said Weis, who grew up playing the sport.

The more the brand got involved with the pros, whose only time off is a few weeks in December, the more they realized just how much year-round opportunity there is to connect with tennis fans and casual players. “The marketing strategy became more 360 than with some of our other categories,” said Weis.

Snaps from FP Movement’s US Open Tennis Clinics

This year, they’ve held tennis clinics during the Charleston Open, French Open, and the US Open. For the US Open, they originally planned to host five tennis clinics but increased it to six after they sold out within hours. Held at The Seaport in partnership with Racquet Magazine and Chase Sapphire Reserve, and hosted by Sloane Stephens, they included discounted full outfitting by FP Movement in tickets priced at $128 (clinic + outfit) or $198 to add in the Lacoste tennis shoes.

Conveniently, many of the brand’s best markets also happen to align well with the tennis calendar, including New York, Los Angeles, Charleston, Miami, and Texas, which all host tournaments (or have one close by) throughout the year. “It’s been fun to figure out how to engage our organic communities there around these events,” said Weis.

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What’s next

Weis and her team are already brainstorming ways to broaden their reach next season. “There’s just so much love around tennis, which makes it more fun to plan how we can go bigger and better next year,” she said.

It’s also budget planning season and Weis, the team’s number one tennis truther, will be kindly asking for more, please. “My internal struggle is that with a brand like FP Movement, you have to share real estate with other sports, whereas if you’re a Wilson, you can go all out,” she said.

Still, she’s not giving up on the grand plan.

“It’s been a fun journey and such a marriage of all our internal teams,” she said, “but I think there’s so much more we can do to become that household name.”

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Thanks for reading! If you have tennis news or tips to share, email jessica@hard-court.com.