Outsourcing Practices of Adidas, Converse, Nike, and Reebok

As such, it applied cultural relativism to justify the use of child labor, unsafe labor practices, and near slave labor in its factories. Since then, Nike has been a driving force to ensure fair labor practices across the apparel industry. In 1999, Nike was a key contributor to the establishment of the Fair Labor Association, an organization that is “…dedicated to protecting workers’ rights around the world” (Fair Labor Association, 2016). Today, Nike continues efforts to ensure that contract factories comply with its Code of Conduct to improve labor standards in overseas factories (Nike, 2016). Because of Nike’s efforts to expand and enforce social responsibility at its factories and given the lessons learned from its sordid past, it is unlikely that Nike would resort to any of the straw men fallacies. However, given the pressure by investors to expect solid returns, one hopes the company continues its altruistic social responsibility efforts while veering away from the Friedman Doctrine and its assertion that “… the only social responsibility of business is to increase profits” (Hill, 2011).

Nike started to open up manufacturing factories in countries like Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam. Due to the wants of Nike to increase their revenue they tried to outsource the labor of their products since labor work in the US is very high and expensive. This was a bad idea due to that Indonesia pays their workers extremely low wages. Pakistan doesn’t have an age limit for them to be able to legally to work so many children in Pakistan were making

A positive impact of Nike’s offshoring strategy was that it allowed Nike to meet the growing market demand of its customers that resulted from global economic growth. It created convenience so customers in other parts of the world could easily acquire Nike’s products and increased customer satisfaction as a result. Moreover, their strategy had a positive impact on the quality of the products offered in various markets. Since labor in Asian markets was able and very willing to meet the quality standards of Nike’s demands in order to retain production contracts, they could meet the expectations that Nike customers presented (Locke, 2002).

The highly recognized name brand—Nike— fails to notice the faults that are happening in factories that are violating a few disturbing rules. The company’s reputation has decreased due to demands and claims Nike; implying that they utilize sweatshops to produce more products at a lower pay. The company has been sued numerous times for abusing and exploiting their employees in factories for years. Another problem that Nike has faced throughout the years was making employees work in poor environments that affected the health of many— which contributed to being abused by the manager for not going to work. Nike distributes and sells merchandise of high quality for a high value. The company is giving the satisfaction of quality service to their

Nike subcontracts the production process of its footwear to 900 contract factories located worldwide with Asian developing countries such as China, Indonesia and Vietnam accounting for the bulk of total world production. Production of the footwear is based on a vertically integrated model. In the primary stage, raw materials such as rubber, leather and plastic are extracted from places located in close proximity from the factories. In the secondary stage, the extracted resources are sent to the factories or “Sweatshops” for manufacturing. It should be noted that the whole production process of Nike footwear are being carried out by independent private contractors.

For years, Nike has been sourcing from factories that seek to meet the company 's minimum standards for good labor performance. The policy of Nike is to evaluate potential contracted factories before they enter the supply chain. Throughout their business relationship with Nike to assess compliance with high standards of social and environmental performance, including country-related risk for issues including forced labor, human trafficking and slavery Nike (n.d).

Nike is a worldwide global corporation that has its shoes manufactured on a contract basis in places like Asia, China, and Vietnam. Although it does not actually own any of the manufacturing locations, it has long been accused of having its products manufactured in facilities that exploit workers. Although Nike admits some wrongdoing in the manufacturing facilities of its contractors, it claims to have started a commitment to improve working conditions in those facilities.

Investigation on outsourcing within business. The outsourcing of trainer companies within developing countries with particular emphasis on Nike outsourcing history.

The purpose and intent of this paper is to describe the legal, cultural, and ethical challenges that face the Nike Corporation in their global business ventures. This paper will also touch on the roles of the host government and countries where Nike manufactures their products and the author will summarize the strategic and operational challenges that Nike managers face in globalization of the Nike product.

Nike has seldom manufactured products own premises, except their air bladders. The shoes are manufactured through outsourcing and alliances with other companies. A successful company like Nike formed its organization on the customer values that have the MOST impact on the consumers mind – Design/R&D, Marketing and Distribution. Even though manufacturing is a vital function to perform, Nike realized that there were other ways to go about this function and thereby save both cost and maintain its focus on the critical customer value areas.

Supply management is a complex function that’s critical to business success, responsible for delivering efficient costs, high quality, fast delivery and continuous innovation throughout companies’ entire supply chains. The strategic contribution of supply management is measured not only in savings made, but also in increased shareholder value (Niezen, Weller & Deringer, 2007). Nike and Adidas are two global companies try to improve their competitive advantage through strategically managing and utilizing their supply chain. The purpose of this report is to compare and evaluate the supply chain management practices of Nike & Adidas.

Nike grew at a compounded 20 percent growth rate and earned a 31 percent ROE for its shareholders through most of the past decade.

American business should not be permitted to claim it is an ethical firm if it ignores unethical practices by its international suppliers. For the purpose of this assignment I will use the Nike Company to highlight its unethical practices. Despite the popularity of Nike in the American market, it has been accused of exploiting employees abroad. The corporate social responsibility stipulates that a company should maximize its profit and minimizes its cost in operations and manufacturing, also at the same time benefit the community it operates in. This paper will further elaborate on the global strategy employed by Nike Company as it outsources its goods and the unethical issues its

Nike took responsibility and created stringent benchmarks for production associations - the Code of Conduct (CoC). While CoC became a need and necessity as it was evident that there still was more to be carried out to direct and deal with the inventory network. Nike constituted the CR Board. It also disclosed the locations of the source factories and manufacturing plants. Nike took measures to match the expectations and published its progress reports. This signalled Nike’s tough stand against these issues and that Nike takes is very seriously to strictly adhere to the best practices and find the solutions. This has resulted into transparency. It has empowered Nike to better fathom the issues and shape more fitting

With a slogan of “Just Do It,” Nike is known all over the world for its products ranging from apparel to shoes. Receiving recognition and sponsorship from various celebrities and athletes including Michael Jordan, Nike’s brand is generally associated in a positive light. However, the brand itself, variety of products, and numerous sponsors exist as only a few aspects of this continuously expanding brand. Another aspect to consider when addressing the overall existence of a product as well as the constant introduction of new products is the production process itself: how the product came to be, who is involved in creating the product, and where the product is produced.