For over 20 years, Kipsta has been creating products for male and female football players at all levels.
In this article we introduce the Product Certification Team, who ensure that Kipsta products are tested and validated before they are released to stores.
Before being placed on the market, each Kipsta product is subjected to a large number of tests, either using machines (called "torture tests") and/or in the lab, as well as (and especially) by our team of field test engineers, who play a key role in the overall design process of our Kipsta products.
This product certification team has developed a series of tests specifically designed for our products along with test protocols which guarantee a high level of expertise in carrying out the tests on Kipsta products.
The product certification team also works with our design teams to validate their new product designs in order to offer our customers products that are technical and durable at the best possible price.
A certification label is applied to all tested products found in our Decathlon stores.
Our main job is to adapt products to users, and not the other way around.
You may even have the opportunity to meet them if you decide to join our community of product testers (click here!). Emeric, Sami and David are the three "key" engineers of this great team.
Their mission:
- test our football products (including futsal), in order to ensure that each product is suited to its corresponding sport use or discipline and skill level.
- ensure our product offer is comprehensible to customers through clearly defined product benefits (for example, highlighting the different types of traction on football boot models, or comparing the levels of grip on goalkeeper gloves).
These differences and details will help you to choose the right product for you, based on each product's benefits and the product information which you can find on the product sheets on our website and on product info signs in our stores.
- thoroughly test our products before they appear in stores (built into our design process, click here ), and thus meet the expectations of our users whatever their level of play.
- have the products tested by athletes and players before they are brought to market, and analyse the results to validate each product for its intended use and confirm the product benefits.
Durability, or how to increase the lifespan of our products
Through our eco-design process, Kipsta seeks to reduce our environmental impact and further increase the satisfaction of our customers by increasing the lifespan of our products.
In the "Durability" project, presented below, learn about the important role that is played by our test team, represented by one of its field test engineers, Sami.
The overall goal of this project is to be able to objectively and scientifically evaluate the lifespan of our products, starting with our footwear, and understand the factors that impact product durability so that we can then control those factors and improve our products. This is why we engaged the CTC to help accelerate these efforts.
The CTC's main involvement in this project is to provide human and mechanical resources, since Decathlon itself doesn't have all of the needed test machines in-house or the in-house resources to do all of the desired testing. Working with the CTC allows us to get the tests done faster and more efficiently.
The CTC has helped us with its expertise in footwear and access to its teams.
We work together on the selection of tests to run, how much data to collect, and the reliability of the results.
The CTC works together with Kipsta, providing its technical and scientific expertise and resources.
By correlating the data collected on the field by Kipsta, with the data from mechanical tests collected by the CTC, we were able to find a high-performance solution.
The study allowed us to quantify the deficiencies in our products when in use, and to scientifically validate a mechanical representation of these deficiencies.
Thanks to these collaborative efforts, we are now able to evaluate the durability of our products, characterise any potential deficiencies, and improve the performance of our footwear. We are able to reliably confirm a product's theoretical lifespan.
Presently this study is focused on our football boots.
Our goal is to duplicate this same methodology for all types of products, and thus evaluate new product lines and innovations created by Kipsta.
If you would like to take part in our product tests (which take place at the Kipstadium) before they go to market, we invite you to join our community of football testers on our Facebook page.