What is the market size of athletic footware in China?

I just had an job interview and I should answer the question, how big the market size for athletic footware is in China. I was not allowed to check some resources and should estimate it with common sense. Any ideas how I should have done it?

To be very frank this is an opportunity question.

The employer will probably want to see how you use commonsense and how well you know marketing.

There is many way you could answer this and turn up a winner depending how well you know the company.

Common sense would say that the market is probably larger then the market for sports equipment market due to the fact that sports shoes is also purchased by teenagers that does no sports at all and joggers do not buy sports gear.

However coming up with the actual figures may not be easy nor expected by the interviewer unless you have claimed that you know china market well in your resume. In that case , you have blown it. You should have prepared for the interview.

But if you did not know the interview is for the china market and the ad is a general ad for creative marketing, you could use some humour here. Thin line here. You may clinch or break the chance here.

Sorry i wish i can be more help.

Tell them the market size is very small--only the Chinese National Ping-Pong team wears athletic footware--the other billion people wear tap shoes and long, flowing gowns made to look like fantastic dragons. I mean, how the hell can they expect someone to be able to estimate something without a frame of reference?