During Super Bowl XLV in 2011, Skechers managed to separate itself from the bevy of advertisers on Fox with a steamy commercial featuring Kim Kardashian getting sweaty, and then breaking up, with her personal trainer.

Skechers in 2012 has again managed to get national attention with a commercial scheduled to air during Super Bowl XLVI on Feb. 5 on NBC. This time, however, it is Mark Cuban and a French bulldog named Mr. Quiggly who are stirring up the masses.

The premise of the commercial, Skechers’ third consecutive appearance in the Super Bowl, sees Mr. Quiggly wearing the company’s new GOrun shoes and outdistancing a pack of greyhounds. The spot, as yet unseen by the public, attracted the ire of greyhound advocacy groups that want to ban greyhound racing. Among other efforts, they have taken the offensive and initiated petitions to have the ad pulled.

Somewhat lost in the dust-up is that, despite headlines and stories to the contrary (“Kim Out, Dog In”)  Skechers said that Kardashian was not replaced by Mr. Quiggly and that the reality TV celebrity, whose contract expired at the end of 2011, may again be associated with the company.

Skechers is taking the greyhound backlash situation seriously. Still, the Manhattan Beach, Calif.-based company has equally intense challenges with which to deal.

Although a $2 billion firm, Skechers is a neophyte in the highly competitive running shoe category, where Nike and adidas are among the leaders. As their Super Bowl commercial – scheduled to run just before the two-minute halftime warning – offers, Skechers sees itself as an underdog.

The goal: To establish itself in the running/jogging footwear category, which is a $3.35 billion industry, according to trade group Sporting Goods Manufacturers Assn.

Although Mark Cuban is new to the company’s roster of endorsers, Skechers has a history of working with athletes and celebrities. Previous marketing campaigns have featured the likes of Joe Montana, Karl Malone, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wayne Gretzky, Meb Keflezighi, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Carrie Underwood, Ashley Simpson, Robert Downey, Jr., Rob Lowe, Denise Austin and Brooke Burke (pictured at end of article).

Big Lead Sports spoke with Leonard Armato, president of Skechers Fitness Group, about the company’s Super Bowl strategy and the related controversy. Armato, a graduate of the University of San Diego Law School, is a veteran in the world of sports marketing. From 2002-09 he was CEO for the AVP Pro Beach Volleyball Tour. Prior to that, he founded and was CEO for Management Plus Enterprises, where he represented such athletes as Shaquille O’Neal, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Ronnie Lott, Hakeem Olajuwon and Oscar De La Hoya.

Big Lead Sports: Skechers ran an ad during Super Bowl XLIV that used Joe Montana’s voice but was largely nondescript. Then came the Kim Kardashian ad during Super Bowl XLV and now the Mark Cuban-Mr. Quiggly spot, both of which drew enormous national attention. What motivated that significant change in strategy?

Leonard Armato: I joined the company in 2010 and was involved with the whole Kim Kardashian [campaign]. It was interesting because we wanted to try to create interest in our ad before the Super Bowl. The initial characterization of the spot, the entire creative of which we kept under lock and key, was that Kim was going to break up with someone in front of 100 million people, meaning the Super Bowl audience. The ad was about a break-up, which turned out to be prescient because of what happened recently with her and Kris Humphries. So everyone wanted to know who she was going to break up with. We got a tremendous amount of publicity off of that.

Then, the second wave of publicity was that Kim’s Skecher’s ad was too hot for a Super Bowl audience. That played-up the whole sex-appeal angle. We got about 1.6 billion media impressions from the ad that we did with Kim. That was great leveraging of our Super Bowl buy. Kim got us more attention than we ever dreamed.

BLS: How did that translate for Skechers into brand appeal, recognition and sales?

LA: Kim Kardashian has had a tremendously positive effect on the Skechers brand. Her campaign helped to establish Skechers as more than a lifestyle company and continued to elevate the public perception of Skechers as a brand that consumers trust. We saw that in surveys, research and other studies that we track. In particular, BrandTease, a research firm in New York, which does an annual survey of the top 500 brands in the U.S., showed that Skechers moved up from 388 to 99 among companies with the highest brand trust.

BLS: Were you committed at that time to run an ad during Super Bowl XLVI?

LA: This will be our third consecutive Super Bowl. We feel that the Super Bowl has become a great platform for us to reach consumers and to tell the Skechers’ story. Then we began to discuss how we could top the interest in that. And I guess we might have done that. In this day and age, you have to cut through the clutter. Communication is so powerful. But it’s not the easiest thing in the world to do. But when you do it, you can have fun with it.

BLS: Did you already know Mark Cuban?

LA: I’ve know him for about ten years. I’ve been friendly with him for a while. Two things about Mark that are fantastic: He’s a technology trendsetter; he’s on the cutting edge of what’s going on in technology. We wanted to communicate that our new GOrun shoe has revolutionary new mid-foot strike technology. Mark was an early adapter of our product. So we saw him as a great person to be, let’s call it the voice, of the campaign. He also represents and can be a great orchestrator for the spirit of GOrun, which is all about the underdog doing something remarkable. Certainly Mark is an underdog. No one expected a poor kid from Pittsburgh to become a billionaire. Then, ultimately nobody expected his Dallas Mavericks to win the NBA championship.

BLS: Skechers wrote in a press release that Cuban “buys into” the GOrun brand, but he hasn’t said anything about a financial investment on his part.

LA: Yeah, well . . . The nice thing is that he’s a guy you can’t buy. He is going to make the decision to either buy into what you are doing or not.

BLS: Skechers also is getting attention for the ad from groups trying to protect greyhounds and outlaw greyhound racing. How is the company handling that?

LA: We at Skechers are certainly animal lovers. We had the Humane Society on the set during the filming of the commercial. They wrote a letter confirming that everything was done to their standards. No dogs were harmed at all during the filming. I know that the activists haven’t seen the spot so they don’t know what they’re protesting against. The spot is not so much about glamorizing greyhound racing as really showcasing the indomitable spirit of an underdog who achieves something remarkable.

BLS: The ad is going to run right before the two-minute warning at halftime. Was that a spot that Skechers was able to select, or was it an NBC decision based on content and the content of other commercials?

LA: Our media buyer was totally responsible for the placement. Last year, our spot ran right before the two-minute warning at the end of the game. And that was a real nail-biter. There are two problems with that placement. One, people are usually festive by that time. If the game’s been on a long time, they need something more to drink. The second thing is, if the game is a blowout, they won’t be watching any more. Fortunately, last year’s game was close and, in fact, we had one of the largest audiences in TV history.

BLS: Who are you targeting with GOrun?

LA: It’s a running shoe that’s absolutely targeted to both men and women, which is why the Super Bowl fits into the strategy.

BLS: What are the marketing plans post-Super Bowl? The Summer Olympics, which NBC is also broadcasting? The ING NYC Marathon, which in 2012 will air nationally on ESPN2?

LA: The Olympics will be a big thing for everyone. All of the athletic companies will show up in London this summer. Certainly, the Olympics will be the 800-pound gorilla [in marketing] this year. Obviously, the NYC Marathon is a big time for runners. Meb Keflezighi ran a personal best in the 2011 ING NYC Marathon wearing GOrun and he has qualified for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team, so he will continue to be a spokesman for us.

BLS: Aside from your commercial, what will you be looking at as far as Super Bowl XLVI marketing?

LA: I always look forward to the Super Bowl to see how other companies are producing their advertising and engaging consumers with their advertising. Doritos has made a name for themselves by engaging consumers to create advertising. Go Daddy gets noticed because they are pushing the sex angle as far as it can be pushed. I’d like to see if Volkswagen can top their Darth Vader commercial from last year. And I’ll be excited to see how people react to our commercial.

BLS: I’m seeing a lot of dogs in other commercials, kids, humor, the usual suspects. Why is your commercial going to stand apart?

LA: I think we have one of the best ads, if not the best ad, in the game. Animals are big, whether it’s a dog, a Clydesdale or some other animal. We’ve got that. Celebrities are big, so [companies like to] put a celebrity in there. We’ve got that. Humor is big. We’ve got that. And sex is big. But we don’t have that this year.

BLS: What about a commercial in Super Bowl XLVII?

LA: That would be speculating at this point. But we’ve been in the Super Bowl for three years and have had success. I don’t know why we would change. But I’m not ready to commit to that yet. What we have to do is continue to communicate to consumers about the GOrun line. Both about the revolutionary technology of the product and the spirit of the brand. There are a lot of people who are interested in us now. It’s getting quite a buzz. There is a definite momentum that we are building. You always want to keep elevating the perception of the brand among consumers. We want it to stand for something as a brand in running and performance, and the spirit that everyone has within them to find that champion.

Big Lead Sports coverage of Super Bowl XLVI continues here.