Building the future together: Insights from New Balance’s Global Town Hall 2026

Strategy, culture and innovation converged at New Balance’s latest Global Town Hall. Bringing together more than 1,400 associates at The TRACK at New Balance and thousands more via 19 global watch parties, the annual gathering served both as a performance review and a forward-looking blueprint. For the independent sportswear label, the message was unequivocal: sustainable growth starts from within.

In a LinkedIn post following the event, President and CEO Joe Preston described the Town Hall as a moment to assess 2025 while defining the company’s strategic priorities for 2026. Those priorities centre on “driving meaningful growth, ensuring executional excellence, and leaning into powerful moments where our teams can deliver at the intersection of sport and culture.” He highlighted updates from innovation-led product creation and global marketing leadership, outlining key opportunity areas and the ambition to further elevate the brand’s global positioning. In industry terms, it signals a disciplined innovation pipeline, vertically integrated craftsmanship and a marketing ecosystem built to translate cultural relevance into sustained brand equity.

Yet the Town Hall extended beyond metrics and market share. Preston reaffirmed New Balance’s long-standing values of teamwork, integrity and total customer satisfaction, principles echoed by leaders across the business. The “OneNB” culture, the company’s shorthand for global collaboration and cross-functional alignment, was framed not as rhetoric, but as infrastructure: a system that enables scale without diluting identity. On its own LinkedIn channel, New Balance described the event as “a celebration of our people, our culture and our commitment to continuous growth,” underscoring the “energy in the room, and across our global watch parties” as evidence of the organisation’s collective momentum.

Set against the backdrop of sport, culture, and craftsmanship, the Town Hall showcased a brand that sees its people as its primary engine of growth. As Preston put it, he is “excited for what we’ll build together in 2026,” a sense of optimism that encapsulates the shared ambition driving the next chapter. For those inspired by that vision, it may be the perfect moment to join the journey and help shape what comes next at New Balance.