All Star, Asics and Nike – sports marketing successes

Hello,

I continue with my compilation about the sports marketing reviews made by Eduardo Nicholas, from sedentario.org.

Today i write you about All Star, Asics and Nike.

Look at this picture:

Of course you recognize the logo. Converse All Star, but what do you know about the brand?
ALL STAR – United States. Footwear 1908.

The first shoes manufacturers thought to offer its customers only a protection for the feet. And that was true, that was the main function of this products. However, the cultural changes and develolpment of production methods made the shoes a much more complex issue.

That happened when some athletes realized that it was possible to have a better performance using certain footwear. The businessman Marcus Converse noted that the manufacture of products like this could be a great source of money, also he realized that basketball was becoming very popular in the United States. So, with his experience of creating shoes, he decided to create a special one for this kind of sport. His sports marketing idea was to convince the consumer that the product was made especially for basketball players. What today looks common, at that time, was a real good idea for market segmentation.

Initial sales were good, but the business suffered an improvement when an young guy named Chuck Taylor knocked on the door. Basketball player, Chucked Taylor has bought his first pair of shoes produced by Converse Company. Having tested the shoes, he offered  several tips to improve it. He wasn’t a great player, as many may think, but a great designer.

So, it was born the Converse All Star Basketball Boots – Signed by designer Chuck Taylor!

The model was quite unique, had a very distinctive look. In the United States has gainded great  popularity and is known by the nickname Chuck. The reputation of the product of Converse pass the U.S. borders and ended up in distant lands, at the other side of the world.

Now, this one:

ASICS –  Japan Footwear. 1949.

In 1949 Mr Kihachiro Onitsuka decided that he would own a footwear factory. Without much money to invest,  he’d put some machines inside is own house and began the production. His goal was to create shoes for basketball, a sport that was still growing in Japan.

Taking a look at  the All Star models, already very popular in USA, he finally presented the first shoe of his company. Initially he sold the sneakers for the boys who played basketball in the schools of Kobe, his hometown.
But unfornutately shoes’ soles were not very good, causing the athletes slipping all the time. Without loosing his motivation, Onitsuka felt a good opportunity there and started searching for a way to make tennis more adherent. The answer came from nature: one day, watching the tentacles of an octopus, he decided to use that to design a new type of sole.

Innovations like this have made Onitsuka a large company. In 1977 the company won a new name, based on the importance given by their products to the sports, with a lot of benefits. This led to a brand-name composed by “Anima Sana In Corpore Sano – ASICS – (healthy mind in healthy body), the Latin phrase that sumps up the importance of balance between physical activity and intellectual.

Finally:

No introduction needed? Well… did you know,

NIKE – United States. Footwear. 1972

Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman, discovered during a trip, that Onitsuka Corporation manufactures great sport shoes. They thought: Why not to sell these products in U.S.?

So, they founded Blue Ribbon Sports, a distributor of imported shoes from Japan, and in the next ten years generated a good capital, giving their owners the opportunity to take a bigger step.

The idea was to create a new shoe factory, belonging only to them. Money they had, but name? not really. So, in this story, the Greeks took an important role, that inadvertently contributed to the baptism of the world’s of largest brand in this segment. The Greeks had a goddess Niké, daugther of Pallas, the titan and Styx, the nimph. For the Greeks, Niké symbolized the VICTORY.
A few millennia later, in 1972, an employee of Blue Ribbon Sports named Jeff Johnson had a little nuts experience: during a dream, the goddess Niké in person appeared to him. Knight and Bowerman heard Jeff tell the dream and found there a great suggestion to make, since the idea was to manufacture products that care bout sport, and the victory has everything to do with it.

With this, arose the Nike brand. So there it would be one more sports shoes factory, but with their revolutionary style of sports marketing adopted by the  brand they got the success. In the mid-seventies American society was discovering physical activity as reliable source of health and longevity. Sensitive to this new perception, Nike has invested in an aggressive advertising, aimed to the common athlete, who knitted all day to stay in shape. Of couse, Nike imitated also the competitors Adidas and Puma, associating their band with great athletes, too.

The result could not be better: Nike has become the largest sporting goods on the planet.

To complete the curiosities:

• The original pronunciation of the brand was not Nike, as most people think. The correct way of speaking is “Neec”, the same as the name of the goddess.
• If it wasn’t Jeff dream, Nike would have been called Dimension Six.
• The most controversional Slogan of the brand was during the  Olympics in Atlanta, the message was short and direct: “You do not win Silver – You loose Gold.” They’d completly forget about the sports essence, only cared about competition.
• Also the Nike logo, was designed n 1971 by Carolyn Davidson, the design was born before the brand, and was named Swoosh (to move with or make a rushing sound; thefreedictionary.com). At that time, Carolyn earned USD 34$ for the job. The simple shape of the logo was meant to be clear on the surface, so that people could see that it was a Nike shoe.
• Said the greeks that the goddess could even fly and run at great speeds.
• Nike bought in 2003 the All-Star company, a fact which displeased many of the customers..Most complaints were about the low quality of the products.
• In 1958 the well-succeeded businessman Onitsuka decided to give 70% of the company to the employees, sharing that amount in equal parts. In the same year, he launched the model Onitsuka Tiger, the brand’s biggest success so far.

  

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Copyright:

Logos from all brands.
Text from Eduardo Nicholas
Adaptation by me.

 found mistakes? please: sportsmarketinginfo@gmail.com