Nike, Inc.

Nike was founded by two men, Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight, 
who wished to start a revolution in the shoe industry. Bowerman was a track and field coach at the University of Oregon and he was always trying to figure out different ways to improve the skills of his athletes. He tried different kinds of energy drinks, different track surfaces and different kinds of running shoes but all of the footwear manufactures at that time shot down all of his ideas. Knight was an runner from Portland who went to the University of Oregon and really wanted to get into Bowermans track program. When Knight finished in Oregon he went on the Standford University where he earned his MBA in finance. After this he wrote a paper to propose the idea of a high quality running show that would be manufactured in Japan and compete with German brands that were much more established. He then called the manufacturer of Tiger shoes and asked them if he could become one of their distributors. When they sent him his first par of sample shoes he sent them to Bowerman and to his surprise Bowerman not only sold the shoes for Knight but he also asked him to be his partner. 

In January of 1964 they made their first order of 300 shoes and while Knight sold the shoes out of trunk of his car, Bowerman ripped the shoes apart to try to find a way to make them better. Their mini company was named Blue Ribbon Sports. Unfortunately, both Bowerman and Knight had full time jobs so they were not able to dedicate all their time to the company. They proceeded to hire Jeff Johnson who was a runner Knight had met at Stanford. "Johnson became the first full time employee of Blue Ribbon Sports in 1965." 

The first store opened in Santa Monica, and the name Nike was discovered in 1971. The "Swosh" which is the logo of the company was designed by a Carolyn Davidson, a graphic design student at the Portland State University. 

One of the pairs of shoes that Bowerman designed was inspired by his wife's iron. It gave him the idea to do a waffle patterned sole for extra traction. Now the company had a new name, a new logo, and a new design they just needed a start athlete to "elevate the new Nike line" and they found Steve Prefontaine that did exactly this. Unfortunately he passed away at the age of 24, but is known as the "soul of Nike."

Between 1980 and 1989, Nike went through a sort of revolution. The brand was discovered by an NBA rookie, Micheal Jordan. Thanks to his discovery of the brand, the Nike Air line was created. In 1988, the company started a campaign titled "Revolution" and in that period of time is when the famous line "Just Do It" was created. 

Nike has only improved since then and has had many accomplishments such as signing the entire World Cup - Winning Brazillian National soccer team and designing their uniforms. Tiger woods also started using the Nike Golf products with helped the publicity of the company. They have also come out with many new products such as the Nike Shox. The company has been extremely successful since the started in 1950. I personally do not own very much of this brand. My boyfriend owns a lot of their NFL line of clothing and he really likes it. I have one pair of shoes and to be honest they are not very comfortable. I prefer my Puma running shoes which is odd because when purchasing my Puma's I was told that they are not for running but more for doing other kinds of physical activity. I think that it is great that one mans idea was able to become so big. He was very smart in the way he did things and I think he could be an inspiration to many young athletes who wish to invent some kind of sports wear or equipment. 



"President and CEO Mark Parker said: "At NIKE, Inc. we run a complete offense and its based on a core commitment to innovation. Thats how we stay opportunistic, serve the athlete, reward our shareholders, and continue to lead our industry.""

http://nikeinc.com/pages/history-heritage