Nike: Just Do It

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Introduction
Nike, Inc. is a sporting goods and apparel company founded by Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight in 1972. Nike, being a world-wide phenomenon, has “more than 35,000 employees across six continents and in more than 160 countries around the globe. Through our suppliers, shippers, retailers and other service providers, we directly or indirectly employ nearly one million people” (Nike, Inc.). All this is done to help Nike fulfill their goal to “carry on [Bill Bowerman’s] legacy of innovative thinking, whether to develop products that help athletes of every level of ability reach their potential, or to create business opportunities that set Nike apart from the competition and provide value for our shareholders” (Nike, Inc.). Ultimately, Nike hopes to fulfill their mission statement: “to bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world” (Nike, Inc.) and they define an athlete as anyone who has a body.
Both Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight had an attitude of passion and would do whatever it takes to make it to the top. This attitude may have been developed through the track (Bowerman was Knight’s coach while at the University of Oregon), but it was shown through their aggression as they created the Blue Ribbon Sports and later Nike. These two began selling Tiger shoes and studied them “to see how [they] could be made lighter and better” (Nike, Inc.). Jeff Johnson entered the fold and began to create the “first product brochures, print ads and marketing materials, and even shot photographs for the company’s catalogues” (Nike, Inc.). Johnson designed several shoes and even came up with the name of Nike. This was good timing, as Blue Ribbon Sports’ relationship with Tiger shoes fell through, but “Knight and Bowerman were ...

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