What Killed Nike?

Nike’s Weak Horse Moment

Nike is really getting piled on right now. Ahead of Monday’s Boston Marathon, the apparel brand displayed a punchy sign at its Newbury Store:

Runners welcome. Walkers tolerated.

That brash message makes sense in the context of the famously difficult Boston Marathon. Apparently there was some backlash in niche circles because some people end up walking parts of long distance races and shouldn’t walking be encouraged too?

That backlash didn’t register in the mainstream, though. You know what did? The backlash in response to Nike taking the ad down over accusations of “pace shaming.” That walk back, as it were, didn’t make anyone happy. As House of Strauss guest and former Nike executive Jordan Rogers said:

If you try to serve everyone, you don’t serve anyone.

This screw-up is now a flashpoint for a company that, for years, managed its brand in more absurd, but often less criticized ways. That was then, though, when prominent people were scared to speak against florid displays of hyper sensitivity. Also, “walkers” isn’t an identity group, armed with its own public relations department. Nike’s capitulation to POWs—People of Walk—feels safe to mock. The biggest factor, though, in why it’s open season on Nike might just be that it’s a weak horse these days.

The UBS report listed Nike’s litany of problems, but was neutral (hold) in its advice. “Hold” might sound fine enough absent context but this rating follows a five-year stock collapse. You’d hope, from Nike’s perspective, that someone with authority was telling everybody to buy the dip. Instead, UBS looked over the apparel brand’s bleeding, battered body and shrugged. Neutrality in the near term is terrible when you hate where you’re at.

Speaking of where Nike’s at, a week into launching this Substack back on August 23rd, 2021, I had only one regret about the inaugural Nike’s End of Men article.