Ch.4- Marketing Environment

Nike's projected market share from 2011-2020

The Positioning statement of Nike is “For serious athletes, Nike gives confidence that provides the perfect shoe for every sport”. In today’s competitive environment, Nike, one of the global leaders in the sporting goods industry, has established a strong position for enhancing athletic life style. Nike Inc. specializes in footwear, apparel, equipment and accessory products for men, women and children. The company offers footwear for many sports such as football, basketball, soccer, baseball, tennis, golf, walking, sport-inspired casual shoes, kids’ shoes and other athletic and recreational purposes. All of its competitors, such as Adidas, Reebok, Puma etc. have the same type of market group. Nike however presently has about 60% of the Market share in North America in 2014, according to an earning preview article on Forbes.com.

Nike ad with Skylar Diggins WNBA player

Nike's target market is fairly cut and dry, their effective target market are generally for males and females between the age of 12-40. In recent years they have shifted focus towards women, Nike now has more advertisements geared towards women and athletics. They also presently have more female endorsers than ever before. With athletes such as Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova, Mya Moore, Brittney Griner & Skylar Diggins and many more female athletes helping to push their women's training in it's marketing campaign. Their women's brand currently amounts to 20% of Nike's revenue, however by 2017 the sports maker plans to add another $2 billion in revenue according to Fortune.com. 

Nike's brand identity has always been predicated on individualism, performance, and self empowerment, with ad campaigns and slogans like "Just Do It". They've always been able to differentiate and separate themselves from their competitors. Their hi tech recent innovations to the fitness industry such as the Nike Fuel band, which mainly focuses on individual performance, as it helps users track their overall performance levels. They've also paired up with Nike Inc. for more innovation and exposure via apple products. In addition they're working closely with Facebook which has been helping with their brand recognition, in this new marketing age of social media. 

Ch. 3 - Ethics & Social Responsibility

 Nike not to long ago ran into an issue where their code of ethics was challenged. They were being shamed in the public in 1991, when they took their business to places such as Indonesia, China and Vietnam after labor prices rose in Korea and Taiwan. That's when the problems started and an activist by the name of Jeff Balling published a report indicating the poor working conditions and low wages being offered to Nike employees in Indonesia. Nike could've ran from these issues and tried to cover them up. However instead they took on the problem head on and went above and beyond to bring awareness to this issue. Although it took them a few years to really establish change, they voices were heard and something was done. In 1998, after college students had began protesting Nike, the CEO Phil Knight made a speech stating “The Nike product has become synonymous with slave wages, forced overtime, and arbitrary abuse,” Knight said. “I truly believe the American consumer doesn’t want to buy products made under abusive conditions. At this speech they also announced that Nike would increase the minimum age of their workers, they would increase the monitoring of their employees; and they will adapt to the U.S OSHA clean air standards in all of their factories.

In 1999, Nike begins to create the Fair Labor Association. Which is a non profit group that combined companies, and human rights and labor representatives to establish independent monitoring and a code of conduct, including a minimum age and a 60-hour work week, and pushes other brands to join according to this article in business insider. (Business Insider Article). Since they took this initiative, they've also done things such as, publish a detailed 108 report which revealed to the public the conditions, and wages in their factories. 

 Community Investment Breakdown

In 2005, Nike was also the first company in its industry to publish a complete list made available to the public with all of the factories in which they did business with. To this day Nike presently continues to post its information online, it can be located on Nike's corporate social responsibility reports. Also listed on their site, are the different strategies they have in place to reduce waste, support communities, empower their workers, cut energy, etc. They've taken emphasis not only to developing amazing products like the Jordans sneaker, but in addition have put value and focus on their employees, the environment, and the communities. 

Nike's Overal Waste FootPrint

Ch.2- Strategic Planning for Competitive Advantage

 As referenced in Nike, Inc's mission statement, Nike relies on inspiration & innovation in their strategic planning to help set them apart from their competition and give them a competitive advantage. They have not only taken this strategy across the United States, but also Globally. Which has allowed their their Global sales to jump in the past 5 years from under 20 billion to over 28 Billion dollars in revenue in 2014. With more than half of that revenue being from the International market outside of the United States according to Statista.com ( Nike Revenue 2009-2014).

 By attaching inspirational stories and having elite athletes endorse their products in many different sports. With names like Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods, Lebron James, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and many, many more. They were able to push pass their competitors in the sportswear industry and have been known as the dominant and most recognizable brand for years. People have come to love the Nike brand for the quality of the products, in addition to the never ending innovation.

People "camping out" for a Jordan sneaker release in LA.

The Jordan brand, which has been focused and inspired by Michael Jordan has its competitive advantage above the competition because it has a strategic plan in which its brand is based off the greatest player ever. This inspires buyers to buy their shoe because everybody wants to wear the same shoes in which helped Michael Jordan establish greatness in the NBA during the 80's and 90's. With this as their focused the Jordan shoe has been able to re release the same exact sneaker's for years and continuously make a profit off of them. One of the only brands ever which can market the same exact sneaker multiple times and still have tremendous success. It's become so bad, the kids of this generation camp outside the stores for days in tents to wait for a Jordan sneaker release.

Nike Inc Mission Statement

NIKE MISSION STATEMENT

According to Nike's About Nike:

Nike’s mission statement is "To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world."

Bill Bowerman Co-Founder of Nike, Inc.

The legendary University of Oregon track and field coach, and Nike co-founder, Bill Bowerman said, "If you have a body, you are an athlete." Bowerman was a teacher who showed athletes the secrets to achievement. Nike invites you to experience all innovative and inspiring 

Brief History of Nike, Inc.

Bill Bowerman

Nike, originally known as Blue Ribbon Sports (BRS), was founded by University of Oregon track athlete Philip Knight and his coach Bill Bowerman in January 1964. The company initially operated as a distributor for Japanese shoe maker Onitsuka Tiger(now ASICS), making most sales at track meets out of Knight's automobile. According to Otis Davis, a student athlete whom Bowerman coached at the University of Oregon, who later went on to win two gold medals at the 1960 Summer Olympics, Bowerman made the first pair of Nike shoes for him, contradicting a claim that they were made for Phil Knight. Says Davis, "I told Tom Brokaw that I was the first. I don't care what all the billionaires say. Bill Bowerman made the first pair of shoes for me. People don't believe me. In fact, I didn't like the way they felt on my feet. There was no support and they were too tight. But I saw Bowerman make them from the waffle iron, and they were mine."

Phil Knight

In 1964, in its first year in business, BRS sold 1,300 pairs of Japanese running shoes grossing $8,000. By 1965 the fledgling company had acquired a full-time employee, and sales had reached $20,000. In 1966, BRS opened its first retail store, located at 3107 Pico Boulevard in Santa Monica, California next to a beauty salon, so its employees no longer needed to sell inventory from the back of their cars. In 1967, due to rapidly increasing sales, BRS expanded retail and distribution operations on the East Coast, in Wellesley, Massachusetts.

By 1971, the relationship between BRS and Onitsuka Tiger was nearing an end. BRS prepared to launch its own line of footwear, which would bear the Swoosh newly designed by Carolyn Davidson. The Swoosh was first used by Nike on June 18, 1971, and was registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on January 22, 1974. In 1976, the company hired John Brown and Partners, based in Seattle, as its first advertising agency. The following year, the agency created the first "brand ad" for Nike, called "There is no finish line", in which no Nike product was shown. By 1980, Nike had attained a 50% market share in the U.S. athletic shoe market, and the company went public in December of that year.

Together, Nike and Wieden+Kennedy have created many print and television advertisements, and Wieden+Kennedy remains Nike's primary ad agency. It was agency co-founder Dan Wieden who coined the now-famous slogan "Just Do It" for a 1988 Nike ad campaign, which was chosen by Advertising Age as one of the top five ad slogans of the 20th century and enshrined in the Smithsonian Institution. Walt Stack was featured in Nike's first "Just Do It" advertisement, which debuted on July 1, 1988. Wieden credits the inspiration for the slogan to "Let's do it", the last words spoken by Gary Gilmore before he was executed. Throughout the 1980s, Nike expanded its product line to encompass many sports and regions throughout the world. In 1990, Nike moved into its eight-building World Headquarters campus in Beaverton, Oregon.