Knight In The 1970's Blue Ribbon Sports

Philip Hampson Knight was born and raised in Oregon and was able to attend the University of Oregon and graduate in 1959 with a degree in journalism. Knight also earned his MBA from Stanford in 1962. During Knight’s time at the University of Oregon he was a member of the track team. After he graduated and entered the workforce he realized that he had a passion for something he had never thought about as a career. Knight wanted to be an entrepreneur and he dove into his dream by flying to Japan to meet with a shoe manufacturer. When he met with the manufacturers he introduced himself as the head of Blue Ribbon Sports, which was a company that he made up on the spot, this started Knight’s career as an entrepreneur. Knight partnered with his track

coach from the University of Oregon, Bill Bowerman and began selling shoes at track meets as Blue Ribbon Sports. In the 1970’s Blue Ribbon Sports was already reaching $3 million in sales, at the time Knight started creating his own shoes.

In 1972 Knight created Nike and paid a college student $35 to design a logo for his new company. In the early days of Nike they earned the reputation of having a party atmosphere at corporate events where screaming, fighting, and consuming alcohol and drugs were common and even encouraged. Nike became increasingly popular and was at the top of the sneaker game in 1990 when many forms of controversy and some questions of Knights character arose. Nike was able to get through the controversy and remain at the top of athletic footwear and Phil Knight was named the “most powerful” person in sports in 1993. The controversy continued to attract itself to Nike and as the founder and CEO many scrutinized the way Knight handled himself and the company in those situations. Phil Knight is one of the most successful self made billionaires in history but many dispute whether or not he is one of the best business leaders of a

generation.
Phil Knight is a self made man and there is no disputing that. Knight was able to take advantage of his chance to pursue the “American dream” when he graduated from college and got a good job as an accountant but then decided he would rather pursue a career as a shoe salesmen. After taking a risk and going to Japan to meet with a manufacturer without having any experience as a business owner and very little experience in shoes outside of his own personal use he was able to partner with his college track coach Bill Bowerman when they both invested $500 to start the business where Knight would be selling sneakers to people at track meets. The business took off and once Bowerman and Knight decided to start designing their own shoes their business changed forever. They came up with a waffle type design for a running shoe that would be both lighter and more supportive, this shoe took off and that is when they named their new show brand “Nike” after the Greek goddess of victory.
The first Nike shoes with the waffle design in the sole took off and in the 1972 Olympic trials the top seven marathon runners wore Nikes, which of course was enormous for growth of the business. In the 1980’s Nike reached past track and field and began innovating shoes for other sports. When tennis player John McEnroe switched to a Nike shoe because of increased ankle support that model of tennis shoe became a top seller. Major sport stars were demanding compensation for wearing Nike gear and Knight had no issue paying them for the exposure because his $500 investment had rapidly made him worth $178 million.
It would be absolutely impossible to dispute the fact that Phil Knight is one of the most successful businessman in American history and also a pioneer in the shoe industry. Knight not only was able to change how people designed athletic footwear but he was also able to change how people viewed sports in a way. Once Nike became one of the big names in sports they were able to use stay ahead of their competition because of how innovative people like Phil Knight were in designing new models of sneakers that were lighter, more durable, more supportive, and more stylish then anything else on the market. Phil Knight proved himself to be both a designing and marketing genius especially in the 1980’s and 90’s. During this time Nike was proving that they were at the top of the shoe market and because of this they had absolutely no problem finding superstar athletes to wear their shoes and other products. Nike had sponsored athletes in many different sports but in 1984 they rose to a new level when they signed Michael Jordan to a shoe contract and gave him his own model called the “Air Jordan” which was originally banned by the NBA. The ban as well as Jordan himself brought unbelievable amounts of popularity to Nike and they were on their way to dominating basketball. In the late 1980’s Nike signed a deal with Bo Jackson who was a star athlete in both professional football and baseball. The “Bo Knows” campaign was to support their new cross-training shoe, which was designed to be used in all different types of athletics as well as everyday life. Both of those huge superstar endorsements along with the innovative shoe designs propelled Nike to the very top of the athletic shoe market. Phil Knight is one of the main reasons why Nike grew as rapidly as it did. Knight’s mind to create new shoe designs and his vision to see exactly what they needed to do from a marketing standpoint in order to bring them to the top of their market, reaching $1 billion in revenue for the first time.
The 1990’s were a very interesting time for Phil Knight and Nike.

They were continuing to grow and maintain their spot as one of the leader’s in sports. They continued to expand into different markets by creating hockey equipment and signing stars like Jeremy Roenick and Wayne Gretzky to endorsements. Nike also was successful in signing Tiger Woods to an endorsement deal, which was a game changer in golf equipment. During this time of extreme success many thought Nike would never be stopped and would take over as the only brand for sneakers and sporting equipment. Until 1990 when Reverend Jesse Jackson spoke out against Nike and started a boycott because of their lack of support for African Americans who are very large number of their consumers. At that point Nike had still never had and African American Vice Presidents or board members, Reverend Jackson’s argument was that they were exploiting African Americans by targeting them with advertisements and endorsements but they had no African American influence in their upper level management. Another issue that Phil Knight was accused of was being insensitive toward the inner city because with sports being a major parts of the inner city of course any athlete would like to have the best accessories to help them play the best. But Nike was something special, with their superstar and celebrity endorsements they were not only the best footwear for sports but also a fashion statement and a symbol of status at times. Nike

continued to raise prices which meant more and more people in the inner city weren’t able to afford them which caused violence, robberies, and sometimes murders just so somebody could have new Nike shoes. When Knight was questioned about both of these issues he seemed very uninterested and brushed them aside. The third issue that Nike had to deal with in the 1990’s was possibly the most well known. Nike was accused of having manufacturing facilities overseas (primarily in Indonesia) where the employees were working for a fraction of the already low minimum wage, in horrible and dangerous working conditions. There were also reports of abuse of employees where they would be forced to run until they collapsed for not wearing proper footwear. The Nike factories were also a major environmental concern in other countries. When Knight was questioned about why this was happening and what he was going to do about it he again, seemed to brush it off and avoid the truth. He refused to take reporter Michael Moore who was making a documentary to one of the manufacturing sites and never gave a clear reason as to why. When Moore also asked if Knight would consider manufacturing in the United States where there would be less question as to issues happening in his factories Knight responded by saying that “Americans don’t want to work in a shoe factory” and it would be a waste of time to try to move manufacturing to the USA. This was simply not based on any facts because given the right conditions many Americans at that time were willing to work in manufacturing, including the manufacturing of shoes.
Phil Knight was one of if not the single most innovative designer and greatest marketing genius of footwear in the 20th century. Knight proved himself to be a successful leader but all of his success also comes at a cost. Knight was not morally a strong leader by any means, from the beginning with the alcohol and drug filled company meetings and events until his lack of honesty and accountability toward the end of his career when faced with global issues concerning his company. Knight was definitely in the right business because with his mind and his passion the shoe industry would be completely different today. Knight’s followers have always been and continue to be caught in his innovative genius and they seem star struck by how one man or company could take an industry to levels that were never imagined. Phil Knight would have been more successful and more respected if he had a more serious partner who could have taken the human resources and public relations side of managing the company, which would have stopped Knight from putting himself in controversial situations. If Knight allowed himself to be less of a business leader and just focus on designing and how to market the shoes instead of worrying about everything involved in running a business.