The Knight Of Footwear: Summary Of Shoe Dog

The comparisons between Knight and earlier moguls comprise a large part of the novel. It began when Knight realized the opportunity he had when Michael Jordan began to become a more visible figure in the sports world. Like many successful entrepreneurs before him, Knight quickly latched on to the star and began promoting his product in a way that could reach a multitude of people, and advertise his athletic products in a way that would cause them to sell in great numbers, “Nike was steamrolling its competitors out of the market. The first step had been

Nike is a huge supplier if athletic shoes for the world these days. Philip H. Knight, the founder of this corporation came up with an idea of an athletic shoe at the track field of the University of Oregon.

Nike is the leading and yet renowned supplier of athletic apparel and shoes. The company controls close to 33% of the global athletic shoe market (Dogiamis & Vijayashanker,2009).Nike was founded by Bill Power and Phil Knight in 1962 as a Blue Ribbon Support and then was later on renamed to Nike in the year 1968 (Patrow,2003).The company supplies very high quality product in close to 100 countries with major markets being located in the U.S,U,K, Asia Pacific as well as in the Americas. The company has managed to attain its lead and legendary position via the application of innovative and yet attractive product design which is backed by quality production as well as well crafted marketing strategies.

<br>In 1958, Phil Knight, a business major a the University of Oregon, and a miler on the track team, shared with his coach, Bill Bowerman, a dissatisfaction with the clumsiness of American running shoes. They formed a company in 1964 to market a lighter and more comfortable shoe designed by Bowerman. In 1968, this company became NIKE, Inc.--- named for the Greek goddess of Victory. At first, Knight and Bowerman sold their shoes in person, at track meets across the Western US. Their company thrived through a classic combination of entrepreneurship and innovation. Bowerman 's most memorable technical breakthrough was the optimal traction of the waffle soles he invented by shaping rubber in the waffle iron in his kitchen (1972). Other essential innovations were the

Knight, as a 24 year old, fresh out of business school, decides to travel the world, seeking meaning. His crazy idea back in Stanford comes to mind planning his trip around the world, how the Japanese shoe market could penetrate the German market, just as how it did with Cameras. Knight expresses this feeling over

One man's action in 1985 took a fashion trend and turned it into a global phenomenon, that one company took full advantage of It., Nike. Nike created the "Air Jordan Brand" with Michael Jordan's actions in 1985. Phil Knight the creator of Nike looked at Jordan’s actions as an opportunity to boost the "Sneaker culture" in which it did. Michael Jordan is now the first athlete to be pronounced a billionaire. Michael Jordan's "Air Jordan Brand" has impacted communities, families and the economy as well as fashion itself. The "Sneaker Culture is a global phenomenon that other companies have took advantage of.

Currently, Nike stand as a leading figure in producing high quality sports and fitness equipment and apparels. Bearing just a simple start of selling Japanese imported shoes from a station wagon has transformed

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.

After sluggish focus and growth in the 1980ies, Nike experienced strong growth in the 1990ies and cemented the position as global recognizable brand. The increased international focus created strains on the supply chain, which was consider inadequate to cater efficiently to the organization and the rapid changes consumer demands . As a consequence of the afore mentioned supply chain problem Nike faced inefficient inventory management, problems in flow of goods and poor demand

Decreasing overhead through outsourcing is a valuable resource for Nike. Cutting costs by employing workers at a reduced rate or paying less for plant operation allows Nike to invest the additional profits into other areas of the business such as advertising, thereby increasing the potential for company growth. In addition, decreased operational costs are more likely to attract and retain company investors because more money can go into increasing business profitability.

During the late 80s and early 90s Nike was faced with a series of labor strike back at home due to unethical labor practices by its independent countries in third world countries. It is well known for Nike to outsource almost all its production from third world countries at cheap prices and sell them in U.S. market at an abnormal profit. The company began outsourcing its products from Japan where labor was competent and wages were very low. The living standards were raised which prompted Nike to outsource its products from Thailand, Pakistan and Indonesia since wages in these countries were extremely low and labor for these products were competent due to rapid development of the Japanese economy. The outsourcing of footwear products from Asian countries enables Nike to earn high profits and enjoy a competitive advantage over its rivals in the footwear industry. The company invests the high profits realized in marketing its products through celebrities. For instance, Michael Jordan was used to advertise the positive image of Nike Company (Lipschutz and James, pp. 87-96).

Nike business model has always been contracting underdeveloped countries, mainly in Asia, to produce its athletic shoes at a much lower cost as compared to its competitors. As it is simple to manufacture an athletic shoe, Nike’s contractors are often able to capitalize on the abundance of unskilled and low-wage workers in their home country to cut down on production costs.

In 1963 Phil Knight went to Japan and had a meeting with a running shoe manufacturing company called Tiger. He

Before Nike came into existence Nike's brand was conceptualized at the University of Oregon .at university bill Bowerman was knights track coach.. After his running days were over at university knight enrolled at the prestigious Stanford business school for his master's degree in finance. Whilst

Firstly Nike sold its franchise licenses in different countries expanding the market share in sports wear industry, and then the company moved towards purchasing shares in equity to reduce the risk uncertainty. Finally the company managed to bring the dealers’s corporation under one direction enabling them a better control and monitoring capabilities. Nike is making new policies, analyzing the performance of marketing and advertising with the standards they have set to make sure that the company is in line with its required its standards in addition; company is moving towards improving its advertisement in order to make it more effective in different regions. Nike has also faced different issues while internationalizing the business, such as capabilities, access, finance and business environment; unavailability of trained workers, limited information about the market, inability of contacting foreign customers and new business environments describes these issues on a vast ground.