Phil Nate, Founder Of Nike: From Mediocrity To Excellence

Phil Knight, Nike Legendary leader, once a long-distance runner, is one of the most eccentric leaders in Fortune 500 companies.

In the spring of 1985, millions of television viewers in the United States saw such a passage. Advertisement A basketball quickly rolls to the end of the court, waiting for a handsome young man to hook the ball into the palm of his hand with the feet of the colored sneakers and start to move the ball. At the same time, the harsh noise of the engine engine comes, and the growling of the engine is louder and louder. The last 10 seconds of the advertisement are Jordan's "walking in the clouds". Even those who have never seen a basketball match will sigh with his exquisite skills. The advertisement not only proves that Jordan has a special flight ability, but also suggests that the shoes under his feet also have an inevitable connection.

In this advertisement, the amazing young man is the famous NBA sports star, Michael Jordan, who is the famous brand "Nike" at his feet. Before retiring, Jordan sincerely sighed: "Phil Knight and Nike have turned me into a dreamer." This is nite, the founder of "Nike", who turned a small company into a large group and pushed the once unknown Jordan to the position of the superstar.

Phil Knight, the founder of the famous brand Nike, has been ranked among the top 1000 companies in the Fortune 1000 magazine in the past 1986~1996 years. In 1991, Nike became the world's only sports and fitness company with assets over 3 billion dollars.

Little known is that knight is a sports fan himself, and as a not outstanding athlete, he has become the king of the commercial arena, creating the miracle of fragrance outside the wall. In China, we believe in all roads leading to Beijing, and the success of nite may be a revelation to many Chinese entrepreneurs. {page_break}
 

A failure athlete

In 1938, an ordinary boy was born in the United States. Like most of his contemporaries, he liked sports, basketball, baseball and running. His name was Phil Knight. As an ordinary young man, he was very familiar with sports cards such as Adidas and Puma. But what is unexpected is that this ordinary young man has created a new brand -- Nike, and even surpassed Adidas's dominance in sports.

Nat always liked sports, and his high school papers were almost all about sports. Even the universities chose University of Oregon, which is the base of track and field in the United States. Although nite likes sports, he is just a mediocre 1 mile runner. His worst score is 4 minutes and 13 seconds. He almost didn't enter the ranks of world class athletes (with a score of 4 points). There are too many people like him. But fortunately, we can not see a great entrepreneur today.

In Oregon, Knight met his lifelong mentor, his coach Bill Bowerman. Bowerman broke the world long run record in 50s, and Eugene City, Oregon, became famous. He is a man of great ambition and is determined to make his sports team exceed other teams. In the training competition, the athlete's foot disease is the most common offense. Bowerman wants to design a kind of shoe which is light and good supporting, small friction and strong stability, which can reduce the athlete's foot pain and run a good result.

So, he designed several sports shoes carefully. He found several shoemaking companies, but no one paid any attention to him. The stubborn Ballman simply asked himself for a cobbler and learned how to make shoes. At a sports meeting, his athletes wore shoes made by himself and looked ugly but light and comfortable, and they ran out of a better position than any other match.

After graduation, Knight continued to study for MBA at Stanford University, while Bowerman continued to track and field coaches and design sneakers in universities.

In 1960, Nate graduated. In a survey report, he mentioned that many sports athletes and ordinary athletes have a common goal: beat Adidas, and let more and more athletes wear Tigers shoes, which are high quality and low price in Japan. After graduation, Nate decided to go to Japan to look for an opportunity.

At the exhibition in Japan, Knight met Tiger sports shoes manufacturer in Japan. He claimed to be from the United States "blue ribbon sports company". Just when Tiger needed an agent to enter the US market, he gave the agent to the young lad.

Nite, who got the agent, immediately found Bowerman, and the two of them invested $500 to form a real blue ribbon sports company, becoming the sole distributor of Tiger sports shoes in the United States, and began their initial business. This "Blue Ribbon" is the predecessor of Nike. {page_break}
 

Wildfire burning Nike

At the beginning, there was no barn. He put his stock in the basement of his wife's father's home. He and Bowerman had two people in charge of one piece of Finance and one pipe design. Facts have proved that his prediction of the market is correct. The cheap sports shoes sell well, and in the first year they sell $8000 worth of goods.

In 1968, Cortez shoes, which had been restructured by Ballman, became the best selling products of Tiger sneakers, and knight set a solid financial foundation for the company's development. The company's business is beginning to pick up.

Before long, the Japanese head office noticed that its products were selling well and demanded that they remit the goods first and then deliver the goods. In this way, the cost of Bao man increased greatly and they had to redouble their efforts to sell. But Japan often fails to deliver goods on time, and even secretly sells first-class products in Japan, sending defective products to the United States. Once, they received a batch of shoes, and the customer's shoes and shoes were separated after two weeks. They had to swallow their words, in order to maintain credibility, and promptly returned to customers.

What is more annoying is that Tiger sent representatives to Eugene city and offered to buy 51% of the company's shares and two of the 5 directors. If this request is rejected, the supply will be stopped immediately. Bowerman and nite, who had been hard pressed by Japanese businessmen, were intolerable, and categorically rejected this unjust request.

Knight and Bowerman decided to start a company of their own, named Nike, which is based on the name of the Greek god of victory. The name Nike is very auspicious in the eyes of Westerners, easy to read, easy to remember, and very loud. They soon launched the "Nike" brand of sports shoes, and designed a beautiful logo. Nike's famous "tick" trademark is very eye-catching and attractive, as well as the kind of movement that sports shoes and other sports products should have, symbolizing strength and speed.

On a Sunday morning in 1975, Bowerman fiddled with a urethane rubber (0, -33160.00, -100.00%) in the iron mould of waffles, and made it into a new type of sole. The small rubber round nails in this waffle style shoes made the elasticity of the sole stronger than those of other popular shoes in the market. This seemingly simple product improvement has become the starting point of knight and Bowerman's career.

In 1976, Nike jumped to $14 million from $8 million 300 thousand in the previous year. It develops like wildfire. The company spends a lot of money on developing new style running shoes.

In these improvements, Nike air cushion has left a deep impression on people. The Nike air cushion is used to embed the inflatable pad in the heel part. It is a trump card in the shoe making technology of the company. It can maintain a longer elasticity than foam sponge or rubber. Comfortable and smooth. Nowadays, almost all the authentic Nike sports shoes produced by Nike are inlaid with such air cushions.

Interestingly, consumers do not know the secret, but this is precisely Nike's high quality, high performance and high quality. What should I do? The sales planners took a lot of brains in advertising. Soon, a very distinctive and attractive advertisement appeared. There are two windows in the heel of a Nike shoe. People can see the Nike air cushion on the soles through the window. This advertisement has attracted the attention of consumers and made them see clearly that Nike is superior to other sports shoes.

In the next two years, Nike's sales increased by two times. By the end of the 70s, Nike had nearly 100 researchers, many of whom had degrees in biology, chemistry, experimental biology, engineering technology, industrial design, chemistry and a variety of related fields. This strong research force has developed more than 140 different styles of products, many of which are the most innovative and state-of-the-art in the market. These styles are designed according to different foot types, weight, speed, training plan, sex and different technical level.

These products of different styles, different prices and multiple uses attract thousands of runners, making them feel that Nike is the most complete manufacturer of running shoes, and millions of all kinds of runners of all kinds have this idea. {page_break}
 

Flying with Jordan at the same time

Relying on the concept of never ending enterprise, in 1979, by planning new product launch and strong marketing, Nike reached 33% market share, and finally squeezed into the "iron triangle" built by Adidas, Puma and Tiger, and became a sales star. By 1981, its market share even reached 50%, far ahead of Adidas, and knight himself ran into Forbes's most coveted 400 of the richest Americans.

Nike culture "sports, performance, free and free sportsmanship" is Nike's pursuit of personalized corporate culture. This distinctive corporate culture is an anti traditional corporate image. Nike is a pioneering company with adventurous spirit. In the location of their green Oregon company, a well-designed culture has been developed. An old Nike manager once recalled: "it's like working in an environment full of brotherhood and affection. Colleagues drink together, talk about sports, and call themselves active and anti traditional characters. Every 6 months, nite's management team meets to discuss strategies. This noisy party is known for its tit for tat.

Knight always encourages confrontation and even encourages confrontation. He also accepts loud criticism from others like others. Nike's location, like campus, has forests, jogging paths, lakes and soccer fields. Knight hopes to create a peaceful working environment. He thinks the world is chaotic enough. Working hours should be as free as home. In Nike's famous advertising strategy, it also shows the vitality different from others. The type of athletes Nike is looking for is different from Adidas. They are independent, strong personality, grumpy and offensive. For example, tennis star Mcenroe, people always see him lose his temper on the tennis court and argue with the authority. Agassi, a tennis player, wears a beard and has a long and untidy hair. He shorts jeans as tennis pants, and this cowboy tennis pants has become a characteristic product of Nike. With these big sports stars, Nike sports shoes are no longer just sports shoes, but become idols and symbols of social status.

In 1984, Nike began to rebuild its image with the strategy of advertising spokesperson. He signed a 5 year contract with Jordan, giving Jordan conditions including Nike's stock and Jordan's name on Nike sneakers with unprecedented courtesy. Almost all people think that this is a fool's job. It's just a spokesperson. But NAT insisted on doing so, and Jordan's influence on Nike was enormous. Jordan embodies vitality, prestige, superb athletics level and inspiring sportsmanship. His weight exceeds the mark of any Nike ideal. With the help of Jordan, Nike has created a new brand, "AirJordon", which produces colorful shoes and matching garments from Nike. "Flying Jordan" is not only a successful advertising campaign, but also a victory in the brand war. In the first year, the sales volume is as high as 100 million dollars. The first time Jordan wore such sports shoes was banned by NBA officials, who thought it was against the Union's dress code. Nike is keenly aware that this is a good time to carry out public relations activities, so an advertising campaign was launched to claim that "flying Jordan" was banned because of its revolutionary design. As a result, Nike and Jordan flew on the front cover of countless newspapers, and NBA was besieged. The event ended in favor of Nike. Many people will think of advertising with athletes, but NAT is the most successful. {page_break}
 

Indispensable strong

Nite is a very controlling person. He talks about everything in the company. It can be said that for Nike, he is the spiritual leader and the engine of an enterprise. Thus, many people wonder what happens if Nike does not have nite.

In the middle of 90s, knight had a brief retreat. In the process of his retirement, Nike encountered many problems. In 1999, Nike's sales fell to $9 billion 600 million. Steve Miller, former director of global sports marketing, recalls that although the reason could be attributed to Jordan's retirement and weak economy, NAT, 66, still spoke to thousands of employees at Nike headquarters, frankly recognizing his own and management mistakes.

After reemerging from Mount nite, Nike seems to be changing from a cool product maker to a steady buyer. Since 90s, it has acquired Cole Haan climbing shoes, CONVERSE sports canvas shoes and roller skating brands. It is doubting whether the stubborn image of NAT first is a successful camouflage. He even allowed Nike to enter the field of football, golf and even fashion that he once despised.

Today, Nike's sales of soccer products have reached US $100 million, occupying about 1/4 of the market, and surpassing Adidas for the first time in Europe, not to mention that it spent 450 million US dollars to win 14 years of equipment sponsorship in the Premier League. In the 2004 fiscal year, Nike's sales increased by 15% to $12 billion 300 million, with an astonishing 22% return on capital. However, nite is still worried about the future of Nike: the popularity of retro sports shoes may hit Nike's high-end line again. Emerging brands such as Diesel, K-swiss and Puma will attract ordinary consumer groups who have not yet formed brand loyalty.

On the eve of retirement, when a reporter asked him what the worst thing he could think of, he replied, "that is when I hold my grandson and ask my grandson what is Nike."