FireBrand Masterclass: Nike
In November 2019, it was announced that Nike CEO Mark Parker, who’d helmed the company for over 13 years, was leaving the building. What legacy did he leave behind? Rob Walker AT Medium.com gives us some insight:
Nike’s astonishing brand power always been kind of a logic-defying right-brain phenomenon. Its advertising has routinely achieved cultural talking point status, from the classic (those Spike Lee spots!) to the controversial (using the Beatles’ “Revolution”). Nelly’s ode to “Air Force Ones” was a smash. Its swoosh is one of the most recognizable logos in the world. “Just Do It” is, after all, the precise opposite of a data-driven idea.
It’s worth noting that Parker ascended to the CEO slot in the wake of a failed experiment in switching from Nike-in-your-blood leadership to broad-experience-in-consumer-goods leadership. In 2004, founder Phil Knight, a classic nervy and daring entrepreneur, ceded his CEO role to William Perez, previously the head of S.C. Johnson & Son, maker of Pledge, Saran Wrap, and similar household products. The fit never worked. Perez resigned after about a year, and the home-grown Parker — who started out as a designer in the company’s research and development department in 1979 and worked his way up through the ranks — took his place in 2006.
Parker’s run since then has been impressive. Indeed, Knight handed him a massively successful global brand, but under Parker’s reign, sales have doubled, and Nike’s stock price has soared. Revenue was up 7.5% annually as of May, and the market lately puts the company’s value at nearly $150 billion.
This success can be attributed in no small part to the near-mystical power of the Nike brand. It is highly rare for a brand to work as both an ultra-hipster signifier whose limited-edition releases are covered by streetwear blogs and as a perfectly acceptable thing for your dad to wear. There could be entire case studies devoted to how they’ve created that sort of brand alchemy, but the bottom line is that it defies logical explanation. And stewarding, or even protecting, such a brand is not a job to be done with spreadsheets.
Consider Nike’s decision to double down on its association with Colin Kaepernick. A controversial athlete who was not even actively playing his sport seems, rationally, like someone you’d drop from a sponsorship. Instead, Nike made him the star of its campaign marking the 30th anniversary of its “Just Do It” pitch, celebrating Kaepernick’s willingness to risk everything for social justice (and, in effect, claiming that bravery as part of the Nike notion). There was a noisy backlash, but it faded, and profits rose. The centerpiece ad won a commercial Emmy. Could the left brain have predicted that outcome?
On the other hand, Parker’s tenure, particularly recently, has shown evidence of a company culture that might benefit from some cold-eyed oversight. The Kaepernick campaign arrived just in time to divert attention from allegations that the company had fostered a toxic male-centric environment. Multiple executives departed (including one, Trevor Edwards, who was frequently mentioned as a Parker successor), and Parker issued an apology to his staff about failures in the corporate culture. The company was also embarrassed into changing a policy that had cut performance pay for female athletes it sponsored “who decide to have a baby.”
More recently, the United States Anti-Doping Agency barred Alberto Salazar, a long-distance running coach for the Nike Oregon Project, from track and field for four years for conducting banned testosterone experiments — and disclosed emails indicating that Parker was in the loop. (Nike has stated that Parker transitioning out of the CEO role has nothing to do with this and was long in the works.)
Until now, Nike has been “a company led by pathbreaking design rather than by cunning global distribution and turbocharged e-commerce.”
Only time will tell how its brand will evolve and how Nick Parker’s legacy will be remembered.
Source: https://marker.medium.com/nikes-ceo-is-out-here-s-why-it-spells-the-end-for-corporate-creativity-31f2c99516b3
___________