耐克首席执行官发给员工的备忘录长达860字。但其中33个字格外引人注目：“过去一年，我们将运动置于我们一切工作的核心。我们看到了令人鼓舞的进步迹象，但为了赢得长期胜利，我们还有更多工作要做。”这份备忘录于10月1日发出，就在耐克股价收于每股33.87美元的前一天——这是其12多年来的最低收盘价。这个曾经不可阻挡的运动巨头，在今年已经两次裁员之后，预计2027年还将进行更多裁员。
The Nike CEO's memo to his employees was 860 words. But here were the 33 that stuck out: "Over the past year, we've put sport at the center of everything we do. We're seeing encouraging signs of progress, but we have more work to do to win over the long term." That was sent out on Oct. 1, one day before Nike's stock price closed at $33.87 per share — its lowest in over 12 years. The once unstoppable athletic titan expects more layoffs in 2027 after already cutting staff twice this year.
特德·克鲁兹在标志性美国品牌股价暴跌至12年低点时庆祝胜利。你不得不怀疑，上述那些话——“过去一年，我们将运动置于我们一切工作的核心”——究竟更像是一份忏悔，还是一项使命宣言。耐克选择了政治而非其核心身份，现在正拼命试图纠正航向。
TED CRUZ TAKES VICTORY LAP AS ICONIC AMERICAN BRAND'S STOCK PLUNGES TO 12-YEAR LOW And you have to wonder if those words above — "over the past year, we've put sport at the center of everything we do" — was as much a confession as it was a mission statement. Nike chose politics over its core identity, and it's desperately trying to course correct.
上个月，Outkick的丹·扎克斯克列出了一系列该公司过去几年为讨好左翼受众而做出的决策。2019年，它聘请科林·卡佩尼克作为其30周年“Just Do It”（只管去做）活动的代言人。2020年乔治·弗洛伊德死后，它投放了“For Once, Don't Do It”（这一次，别去做）的广告，其中包含诸如“不要假装美国没有问题”和“不要对种族主义视而不见”等语句。
Last month, Outkick's Dan Zaksheske listed a series of decisions the company made over the past few years aimed at courting a left-wing audience. In 2019, it tapped Colin Kaepernick as the face of its 30th anniversary "Just Do It" campaign. In the wake of George Floyd's death in 2020, it ran its "For Once, Don't Do it" ad, which included lines like "don't pretend there's not a problem in America," and "Don't turn your back on racism."
2023年，它与自我认同为女性的男性迪伦·穆尔维合作，推广女性紧身裤和运动内衣——似乎对穆尔维与百威淡啤合作引发的强烈反弹毫不在意。此外，还有2017年的“平等”广告，其中出现了“球应该对每个人弹跳得一样”等短语。耐克股东拒绝透明度提案，信仰基础机构质疑其多元化、公平与包容承诺。
In 2023, it partnered with female-identifying male Dylan Mulvaney to promote women's leggings and sports bras — seemingly unfazed by the backlash Mulvaney's partnership with Bud Light sparked. There was also the "Equality" commercial in 2017 that featured phrases such as "the ball should bounce the same for everyone." NIKE SHAREHOLDERS REJECT TRANSPARENCY PROPOSAL AS FAITH-BASED FIRM QUESTIONS DEI COMMITMENTS Now, it wouldn't be fair to say that any one of these campaigns sunk the swoosh's stock on their own.
现在，如果说其中任何一项活动单独导致了耐克股价的下跌，那是不公平的。耐克的股价在2021年11月曾创下每股177.51美元的历史收盘高点。
Nike's stock hit an all-time closing high of $177.51 per share in November 2021.
但自那以后它已经下跌了81%的事实呢？很难不将其中很大一部分与该品牌在wokeness祭坛上的常规产品联系起来。
But the fact that it has dipped 81% since then? It's hard not to tie a big chunk of that to the brand's regular offerings at the wokeness altar.
过去几年中，该公司最明显的失误之一是凯特琳·克拉克（Caitlin Clark）标志性运动鞋的延迟发布。正如伊森·施特劳斯和丹·韦策尔等体育作家指出的那样，耐克直到今年六月才放弃克拉克的鞋子。施特劳斯早些时候写道，尽管威尔逊在WNBA球衣销量中排名第五，克拉克排名第一，但该公司觉得必须在克拉克的运动鞋之前首次推出阿贾·威尔逊的运动鞋。尽管阿贾几乎可以肯定是WNBA中最好的球员，但没有什么能让女子篮球迷（或者一般的篮球迷？）就像任何与凯特琳有关的东西一样。
One of its more glaring gaffes within the past couple years is the delay of Caitlin Clark's signature sneaker. As sports writers such as Ethan Strauss and Dan Wetzel have pointed out, Nike didn't drop Clark's shoe until June of this year. Strauss wrote earlier that the company felt like it had to debut A'ja Wilson's sneaker before Clark's despite Wilson ranking fifth in WNBA jersey sales and Clark ranking first. Although A'ja is almost certainly the best player in the WNBA, nothing moves women's basketball fans (or hoop fans in general?) like anything associated with Caitlin.
Caitlin Skirk推出Nike Caitlin 1作为她的第一款签名鞋，Craig Carton Show的发布日期为10月-未经过滤、未经修饰且不可分割。立即下载他的每日播客！
CAITLIN CLARK UNVEILS NIKE CAITLIN 1 AS HER FIRST SIGNATURE SHOE WITH AN OCTOBER RELEASE DATE THE CRAIG CARTON SHOW–UNFILTERED, UNAPOLOGETIC AND UNMISSABLE. DOWNLOAD HIS DAILY PODCAST NOW!
这并不一定是耐克将运动放在次要位置的情况。但它确实散发着身份政治的味道，当一家公司忽视其客户的真正想要什么时，身份政治就会变得昂贵。耐克似乎已经意识到了这一点，但当它被淘汰出标准普尔100指数后，高管们才真正采取行动。
This wasn't necessarily a case of Nike putting sports on the back burner. But it did reek of identity politics, which has a way of becoming expensive when a company loses sight of what its customers actually want. Nike seems to have realized this, but it took it being knocked out of the S&P 100 for the brass to actually do something about it.
这让我们回到了前面提到的备忘录。耐克首席执行官埃利奥特·希尔（Elliott Hill）并没有用这篇文章来详细讲述该公司过去的活动和活动。他提到耐克在印度建立新园区。他强调加快供应链现代化工作。他讨论了耐克将组织成三个地理区域的计划--美洲（北美和拉丁美洲）、APGC（亚太地区和大中华区）和EMEA（欧洲、中东和非洲）。但很难忽视这句关于优先考虑体育运动的一句话。
Which brings us back to the aforementioned memo. Nike CEO Elliott Hill didn't use that note to dwell on the company's past campaigns and s. He mentioned Nike establishing a new campus in India. He emphasized accelerating supply chain modernization efforts. He discussed Nike's plan to organize into three geographic regions — Americas (North America and Latin America), APGC (Asia Pacific and Greater China) and EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa). But it's hard to overlook that one-sentence acknowledgment about prioritizing sport.
将政治注入体育运动几乎总是保证将目光转移到其他地方。2020年后NBA收视率的下滑无疑强化了这一观念。
The injection of politics into athletics is almost always a guarantee to shift eyeballs elsewhere. The cratering of NBA ratings post 2020 certainly reinforced that notion.
政治介入运动品牌似乎同样具有腐蚀性。耐克曾一度迎合政治正确，如今或许终于开始意识到由此造成的损害。OutKick曾联系耐克寻求置评，但未立即得到回应。
Seems the injection of politics into athletic brands can be just as corrosive. Nike went woke a while ago, and it may finally be waking up to the damage that was caused. OutKick reached out to Nike for comment but did not immediately receive a response.