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Diversity, equity, & inclusion at Brooks

Side view of two people walking next to building wearing Brooks black jackets

Our approach

The run is who we are. At Brooks, we believe in the power and kinetic joy of the run. This fuels our passion for the sport and the running community. The shoes and gear we develop, the experiences we create, and the partnerships we build should help make the run inclusive and accessible for all. We are taking a comprehensive and strategic approach to ensure our values are represented in our sport. We are committed to reducing barriers to participation in the run, the running industry, and the running community.
Four runners on a gravel path on a sunny day

Our diversity, equity & inclusion efforts are guided by three objectives:

1

Workplace

Build a diverse, equitable and inclusive workplace.

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2

Runners

Welcome and engage diverse runners.

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3

Run community

Directly engage with our communities to foster diversity and inclusion in running.

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Workplace

Start at home by ensuring a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace.

We believe in the power of diversity, encompassing individuals from different ethnicities, abilities, genders, ages, sexual orientations, body types, and circumstances. We are pursuing practices that will achieve equity in our business and our sport — so everyone feels a sense of belonging as their own, authentic self.
Group of Brooks employees EMEA

Our commitments*:

  • Achieve at least 50% women representation at all levels of Brooks employees in Europe
  • Achieve at least 25% female representation on director level
  • Attain at least 40% female representation on managerial level
  • Maintain at least 4.0 out of 5.0 Inclusive Culture Score on Brooks employee Cultural Strengths Survey

*All diversity, equity, and inclusion commitments apply to the EMEA only

Gender demographics

At Brooks, we are focusing on growing women leadership in our workplace through hiring practices and our leadership and career development programs. We aim to create a healthy pipeline of gender-balanced talent to help lead Brooks.

Cultural diversity

As a global company, we recognize the uniqueness of cultural diversity in the European context. We strive to ensure that our European workforce reflects the diversity of the European population. We collect and analyze data on the demographic diversity of our workforce at each level of our organization as we work towards achieving cultural diversity among historically underrepresented groups.

Pay equity

Brooks began incorporating pay equity analysis into our hiring, promotion, and compensation processes in 2018. During offers and our annual compensation reviews, we analyze pay equity across employees in similar roles within our organization.

Inclusive culture

Brooks is committed to maintaining a workplace culture where everyone feels a sense of belonging and each person’s uniqueness is valued. We contribute to this through our various employee programs, including Mentorship, e-Learning, Insights Discovery, Connect Manager Training, Unconscious Bias Training, New Employee Orientation, and Employee Awards.  On an annual basis, Brooks conducts an employee Cultural Strengths Survey to assess our culture. One area of focus within the assessment is “inclusive environment,” which is rated on a 5-point scale. We also do an overall review of our organization’s annual inclusion scores by demographic cohort to ensure there are no significant disparities between dominant and historically underrepresented groups.

Runners

Ensure representation of all who run.

Brooks commits to tell stories through a diverse set of runners and celebrate the power of the run to bring people together.

Representation in:

Marketing

With a focus on cultural diversity, gender, and LGBTQ+ diversity, Brooks recognizes the importance of representation, and we believe our marketing should reflect all who run. We work to diversify our model casting in photography and videos, our influencer and athlete teams, and our campaign partners. As we continue to track our marketing demographic data, we will learn and build on this foundation to advance representation on the run.

Product wear testing & consumer insights

We want to make sure each run is better than the last — a simple enough principle that guides every design and engineering choice we make. These decisions are brought to life on the unique, real-world humans who wear our gear. Our success is the result of tireless research with runners of every shape, strength, and experience. We value runners’ unique experiences and perspectives and seek to ensure we incorporate the most diverse group of runners possible as we develop our gear.

Run community

Community partnerships

Running has the power to build community and effect positive change. Brooks helps to strengthen our community partners through sponsorships, financial support, and gear donations, so together we can champion the run for all.

Two runners are running together in a park

Brooks x parkrun

Brooks has been involved with parkrun since launching a three-year partnership in the UK and Ireland back in 2020. Across the past three years Brooks has visited dozens of parkrun events, surprising communities with freebies, games and giving parkrunners the opportunity to walk, jog, run or volunteer in their trainer trials. Recently, the partnership was strengthened with Brooks stepping up to global footwear partner across every parkrun territory and become presenting partner in the USA, the Netherlands and Germany.

 

At Brooks, we believe in a world where everyone who wants to run feels welcome and has the place to do it. parkrun’s global presence and shared beliefs make this partnership a meaningful step forward in efforts to engage people everywhere so all can access and experience the power of the run in their own communities.

 

The multi-year partnership helps to keep parkrun events free, for everyone, forever, supporting all who want to take part – whether that be running, jogging, walking, volunteering, or coming along to spectate.