EPISODE TWO: Nike/Kaepernik

10.01.2018 - Transcription by Kristina Hooper

Zachary: Welcome everybody to Straight Shot. The podcast where we discuss marketing as it impacts everyday life. My name is Zachary Bennett. As always, welcome to my lovely cohost Jennifer Bennett.

 

Jennifer: Hello.

 

Zachary: We are just going to jump into it today. Something big happened a couple weeks ago and it has impacted our everyday life in a big way. We are going to take a minute to kind of talk through the Nike Kaepernik Deal. Two weeks ago today, Nike dropped a new ad with controversial athlete Colin Kaepernik. Everyone has opinions so like most people I take a look at my Facebook feed. I saw that everybody was talking about it. They’re loving it. They’re hating it. They’re being apathetic. I thought to myself “hey this is a great topic for our new podcast.” So, I invited two guests from my Facebook feed to sit in with us today and discuss: one from each side of the controversy. However, one couldn’t make it and ended up canceling this morning. We still have an amazing guest with us today. I’d like to introduce Hal Williams.

 

Hal: Hello. Hello.

 

Zachary: How are you?

 

Hal:  I’m doing good.

 

Zachary: How is the owner of Clean It Green Carpet Cleaning? We met through a local networking group several years ago. I know that as a business networker, you have a thirty second commercial in your hip pocket in your holster.

 

Hal: I’ve never done a thirty second before. Can you tell me what a thirty second is?

 

Zachary: You liar.

 

Jennifer: It’s your elevator speech.

 

Zachary: Let’s hear it.

 

Hal: My elevator speech: Hello. My name is Hal Williams. I’m with Clean It Green Carpet Cleaning. I do carpet, upholstery, hardwood floors, tile and grout. If you bribe me hard enough, I might even strip and wax a floor for you. Based out of Suwanee, I cover the metro area. I don’t upsell because I want you to call me back. People hate upselling and I have the best customer service that you’ve ever seen. I want to make sure I get fans not just clients. So, if you need your carpets cleaned, the couches cleaned or anything like that, call me for an eco-friendly, great customer experience. Hal Williams: clean and green.

 

Jennifer: Nice. How do they call you? What’s your number?

 

Hal: 678-926-8402 or cleanitgreensolutions.com

 

Zachary: And of course you’re on Facebook.

 

Hal: What is this Facebook thing you refer to? Yes, I am on Facebook. I have a Facebook page. You can find me on Google as well.

 

Jennifer: He gets around.

 

Zachary: Oh yeah. He’s very popular on the Facebook which is how he got here today.

 

Hal: Yes, I try.

 

Zachary: How is a business owner, of course as I am, as business owners, we can provide some insight into how marketing decisions like the one that Nike has made recently can impact someone’s business.

 

Jennifer: I think before we do that, we should probably discuss and give an overview of the Kaepernik situation.

3:40: Colin Kaepernik Taking a Knee during National Anthem

 

Zachary: Okay. Well for those of you that aren’t aware of what’s been going on in at least social media if not T.V. for the last several years almost now, Colin Kaepernik was an American football player in the NFL. In 2012, he led the San Francisco 49ers to the Super Bowl. The next year, 2013, they made it into the playoffs, all very good for Colin Kaepernik. However, for the next three years, the 49ers did not have a winning season. Then, in 2016, he ignited a nationwide controversy by deciding to not stand up for the American National Anthem. But instead, he decided to take a knee. Once he was noticed for doing that, he indicated that he was doing it out of protesting racial injustice in the country that was being celebrated by that song. That is where the controversy comes in. People started saying he was disrespecting the country: the people fighting to defend the country. Other people were saying, “Shut up, he has the right to protest; this is America.” Other people were celebrating what he was protesting or joining in thinking that he was right in what he was doing so that’s kind of where the controversy all started right there.

 

Jennifer: And actually, this was the second time or the second way. The first three times, he was a bench warmer. He simply stayed seated. Every time the National Anthem would come on, he would just stay seated. That was the way that he was deciding to protest. Nobody really noticed. I mean not too many people noticed and if they noticed, they didn’t really say too much about it except for one guy. Now, this guy’s name is Nate Boyer. He is an Army Special Forces veteran. He was very upset with the fact that he was seated during the National Anthem. He couldn’t understand why he was doing that, so he reached out to Kaepernik and expressed his concern about him sitting during the National Anthem. Much to his surprise, Kaepernik actually emailed him back or communicated with him back and had a very intelligent conversation with him where they actually met at some point off sight. He asked him, “Why are you doing that?” He was like, “Let me explain it to you.” He explained his reasons. The interesting thing about Nate Boyer being a Special Forces veteran is that he understands that the reason why he fights overseas is for the rights of the people here in the United States. He supported Kaepernik’s right to protest. He just did not appreciate the way he chose to protest. He said, “Can I make a suggestion that if you want to protest for the reasons that you are suggesting, can I suggest that you take a knee?” While he was supporting his right to protest, he found out that he was going about it to be disrespectful: sitting is disrespectful. Taking a knee is a sign of respect in our culture as well as especially in the military. In the military, you take a knee for a fallen solider: Airmen, Marine, whatever. You take a knee in reverence in respect in honor. In this country, we take a knee when we pray. We take a knee when we’re being mindful and we’re being quiet. So, taking a knee is supposed to be a sign of respect and that’s what Nate Boyer was trying to communicate to Colin Kaepernik. So, he suggested if you want to protest, please possibly consider taking a knee.

 

Zachary: He did.

 

Jennifer: He took a knee.

 

Zachary: He started taking a knee and when he did that, all of the sudden, he wasn’t staying seated. I think because he was a bench warmer before, him staying seated was just like him being lazy and not doing anything. When he actually started to take a knee, that was an action and people noticed.

 

Jennifer: Yeah. He did a more forward thing.

 

Zachary: So, people noticed. Since that year- since the year that he did this- he has been a free agent which is NFL speak for being unemployed. In 2017, he filed a grievance against the NFL saying that they were colluding against him so that he couldn’t be hired anymore. Before we get in to Nike, Hal tell me what you think personally of his protest, the impact that it’s had on his own career whether he was being colluded against. His impact on the country and on the NFL because people are saying it’s bad for football. It’s bad for the country. What are your thoughts about since you’re here?

 

8:04: Opinions on Kaepernik Taking a Knee

 

Hal: Since I’m here, one thing about the part of him being a bench warmer. The protest with him sitting down started in the preseason, so he wasn’t even dressed out. Often times, they don’t have the first stringers or second stringers playing during the preseason.

 

Zachary: Are you a football fan?

 

Hal: I am a football fan. I’m a loyal Cowboys fan even though they are kind of garbagy right now. That’s another story for another podcast. Check with me in five years and I’ll see if I’m happy enough to talk about it. In terms of the protest, for my personal standpoint, I understand the protest. For me, I like digging into the details of things. I understand why everybody is upset. It’s the National Anthem time. This is when the NFL started to doing the National Anthem having the players out there because of a situation they worked on with the government. It’s kind of like it was a payment. There was money exchanged to have the players out. They have the big flags out and everything. So, to protest during that time, upset a lot of people because you’ve heard numerous arguments about it. You’re disrespecting the military because that’s the time to honor the military. You’re disrespecting the flag because he even said, “I’m not going to stand for a flag under which injustices are going on, etc.” Then, you get also the “you’re disrespecting law enforcement.” Even part of the controversy was the day after his protest went public, he was at practice and he was wearing socks with cops as pigs on it.

 

Zachary: Yes.

 

Jennifer: Oh, I didn’t hear that.

 

Hal: Yeah, he had those on that made it worse.

 

Jennifer: He had a reputation a little bit before all this for not liking law enforcement very much I think.

 

Hal: He may have, but once he did that and we know how the environment is in the country now. So, a lot of the arguments that we have, regardless of what side of the aisle you’re on or regardless of what your thoughts are, everything is rush, rush, rush. Everybody goes for the high level. You get a couple of facts. You make a judgement on it. You start arguing from there and don’t go into the details. It didn’t matter that right after he wore the socks, he gave a statement and said, “I’m wearing this to protest the bad cops not all cops: the bad cops.” But, what we have is a situation where you’re protesting police in general that’s wrong. It erupted from there. What we’ve seen from our perspective is it did polarize the country. You have some people who completely don’t care what he’s protesting about because of the time when he chose to protest. You have that. Some people who were saying to me it just seems like there are a few of these people who say, “You know what. I understand what you’re saying. Pick a better time to do it.” Then, you have a lot of people definitely a lot of people of color like myself. Also, people who may lean towards a different side of the aisle who are completely focused on the protest and now angry because of the fact that it does seem like he got frozen out of the NFL.

 

Zachary: I think timing has a lot to do with it. Right now, our country is extremely split. You have the very liberal and very conservative. Then, you have people in the middle that are like, “y’all just shut up.”

 

Hal: Yes.

 

Jennifer: Can’t we all just get along.

 

Zachary: I think that this happening at the same time that the elections were going on probably made it worse. You know it’s like you’re this side or this side. If you were in the middle or apathetic like I said earlier, some people are apathetic. If you were in the middle, it’s like people wanted you to choose a side.

Jennifer: Yeah, you weren’t allowed to not be on a side.

 

Hal: Yes.

 

11:57: How the Nike Logo Was Created

 

Zachary: So, there are lots of, our country is actually really, really polarized right now. To me, it’s embarrassing, I’ll just say it. The fact that we can’t with ourselves is pretty, pretty bad. Alright so now, just two weeks ago, Nike released an ad featuring Kaepernik for their 30th anniversary of the “Just Do It” marketing campaign. Before we discuss the ad, let’s talk about Nike, their marketing, and the “Just Do It” campaign. Nike started out as Blue Ribbon Sports. They imported shoes from Japan. Blue Ribbon Sports is not a bad name right. The owners grew their business for seven years on their own, but they all still had day jobs. Like so many of us that are business owners, you start off. You have this little passion that you’re doing or you’re trying to make it on your own and you still have a day job. One of them, Phil Knight, was a teacher of accounting at Portland State University. Carolyn Davidson was a graphic design student at the college. Knight overheard her talking about needing money in order to stay in school. He offered her $2 per hour to make a new logo for his side business. Now, this was a long –

 

Jennifer: $2 dollars an hour?

 

Zachary: This was a long time ago. When I was in high school, minimum wage was $3.15 an hour. You have to think not now when people were trying to feed off $15 an hour, but back then that was minimum wage. For a high school student or a college student in this case, that’s not unreasonable for them to make minimum wage to do this side project. He was looking to start making his own shoes for the first time through a factory in Mexico. The only direction that he gave her for the logo was that it couldn’t look like Adidas because Adidas had the three strips.

Hal: The three strips.

 

Jennifer: That’s what they are?

 

Zachary: That was the only direction that he gave her. After several weeks, she had tracked seventeen and a half hours towards creating this new logo. Davidson met with the partners in their home office and she presented five different options. They all decided to go with the logo that we now see and everybody loves: the swoosh. People talk about how iconic the logo is and how it was only created for $35.

 

Hal: I paid you $35 for this?

 

Zachary: Hiring an art student for minimum wage was all that the partners could afford at the time. Having a professional do it, having an agency do it was just too expensive for them.

Jennifer: Historically, that has always been the case that the larger agencies have been far more expensive. So, that’s why you started doing what you do for smaller businesses.

 

Zachary: That’s right because smaller businesses can’t afford all the big corporate agencies that are out there. Yeah that’s very true. She worked more than she said she worked. She only tracked seventeen and a half hours because she was a college student. She wasn’t very good at tracking her hours. She has said that and I believe her.

Jennifer: I believe her. It takes a long time to make a brilliant logo people.

 

Hal: But, does it really?

 

Jennifer: It really does.

 

Zachary: It’s a lot harder than people think.

 

Jennifer: It’s not all Vista Print Halpert.

 

Hal: Darn.

 

Zachary: People also say, “I’ll just have Fiverr do it.” Well, if you have Fiverr do it, you’re going to get something that looks like clipart. The thing about her is once the company Nike became successful, they came back to her. They gave her jewelry. They gave her stock in the company from very early on. She’s doing okay. So, we don’t have to worry about her.

 

Hal: I think if I remember correctly, everybody that was with the company originally, once they really took off, everybody was a millionaire. So, yeah they’re fine.

 

Zachary: She ended up doing fine.

 

Jennifer: That’s a good boss.

 

Zachary:  The important thing to note about that whole exchange is that she was a creative. She was a graphic designer. She put a lot of thought into what she was going to build for the business. With her design, she changed the name of the business, right. She gave it creative purpose. Now, their name actually comes from the Greek winged goddess of victory. A lot of people don’t know that. Do you know that?

 

Hal: I knew that.

 

Zachary: You knew that.

 

Jennifer: No, he didn’t.

 

Hal: I did. I have taken mythology. Thank you very much.

 

Zachary:  The name comes from the Greek winged goddess of victory. The logo which people call a check mark or a swoosh is actually a wing. For those of you who watch us on video and I’ll put it up on the screen, if you look at this, this is not a check or a swoosh, it is a wing. Do you see a wing?

 

Hal: Yes, I see a wing.

 

Jennifer: I see a swoosh.

 

Zachary:  Alright. Well, this is Nike. This is the Greek goddess of victory. That is why it is so good for their company.

Jennifer: She looks like a volleyball player.

 

Zachary: There is actually quite a bit to her. If you look at the Olympic Games, you know the wreaths that they wear around her head that actually came from her as well. The idea in mythology or their religion at the time is that she would fly down to the battle field. The victors she would put those on their head that’s kind of where that came from.

Hal: Congratulations you blowed them up.

 

Jennifer: You are the victor.

 

Zachary: If you look here, this is a pair of wings that is just two. You can kind of see the check. This is another so that you can kind of see. See it?

 

Jennifer: Oh. Woah.

 

Hal: Oh. Wow. They just left the feathers off.

 

17:47: Nike’s 30th Anniversary “Just Do It” Campaign

 

Zachary: Right, exactly. Once aligned with a marketing agency - once they became more successful, they aligned themselves with a marketing agency. They were able to further develop the brand that Carolyn helped create. In the 80s, Nike was trying to beat Reebok. You remember? How old are you?

 

Hal:  44.

 

Zachary: You remember the 80s.

 

Hal: I do.

 

Zachary: Reebok. Remember they were little high tops?

 

Hal: Yes.

 

Zachary: Reebok was concentrating on aerobics because Jane Fonda was really big at the time. High top sneakers were moving away from converse which is what we had before that. The person they were trying to beat in the 80s was Reebok. Nike decided that they were going to be tougher than their competition in order to be different. Reebok was concentrating on aerobics. Nike decided to go tougher, so go after real athletes. That’s when they came up with their brand mission statement which is to inspire the soul of the athlete not just the jazzercise studio. They decided to hire inspirational figures, sport stars and began the “Just Do It” campaign. The “Just Do It” campaign has always been set around: don’t be lazy, don’t make excuses. You’re doing the maniac over here.

 

Jennifer: I am.

 

Zachary: They went after people like Michael Jordan and all these greats that were in the athletic field and professional sports. They made it more manly if you will than Reebok which is how they were able to beat out their competition. It has been very successful for them. So successful, that they’ve kept it for the last 30 years straight. That brings us to the 30th anniversary of the campaign and the Kaepernik ad.

 

Jennifer: They could have picked anyone.

 

Zachary: They could have picked anyone. There are lots of arguments about who they should have picked. Let me describe for you for those that can’t see. For those of you that are on video, I’ll throw it up on the screen, so you can see what the ad looks like. It is just a black and white picture of his face. It has the words on it that say, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything. Just do it.” Hal, what do you think about Nike’s decision to begin with to hire Colin Kaepernik for the campaign. Then, what do you think about the ad itself. I’m going to try to play the other side since our other guest didn’t come here. I can add in what the conservatives are saying.

 

Jennifer: Zachary is going to try really hard to give you a conservative point of view.

 

Hal: I have seen enough. I could give you both sides of it. I can tell you what. You just cue me in.

 

Zachary: That’s perfectly fine. I’m going to summarize my own thoughts here at the end of the show. I just want to make sure that both sides are represented in what we’re talking about.

Jennifer: I am only here for comedic effect.

 

Zachary: Tell me to begin with what you think about the fact that they hired him. Then, what do you think about the ad itself.

 

Hal: Honestly, when I saw that they hired him, my first reaction was okay cool. They brought in a polarizing figure that is inspirational to a number of people just sheerly because of the fact that he did this protest. It was controversial in the eyes of many. It has cost him his football career. I looked at it and said okay cool. I read the words. I didn’t really think a lot about it because some people when it comes to wording, not everybody is a word Nazi. They said even if you sacrifice everything, most people looked at it as in just terms of his career. For me, my first reaction was okay cool. Then from there, it was this is smart because Nike brought in someone who a lot of people are behind. They’re going to make a lot of money off of that. To, my first reaction was cool ad, smart marketing.

 

Zachary: Now, a lot of people to again talk about the other side. Their biggest issue with him being in the ad is that word: sacrifice because they say, “He didn’t sacrifice anything.” You’re going along with the idea that he sacrificed his career because the NFL has now blackballed him which is what he sued the NFL for to begin with. There are a lot of people that have said, “No that’s not the case.” There’s a ton of backlash that spawned from the very beginning: the Nike stock went down, a reported 3-6 percent. They lost about 4 billion dollars in market share that’s in the first week. Social media posts started coming out condemning them saying that they were committing brand suicide. People started burning their products, cutting out their logos, saying that they should have picked someone else that’s the biggest thing. This guy didn’t sacrifice anything. This guy sacrificed something so that’s a big thing that they did. On the other side, there are tons of memes and social media posts out there about how dumb it is to go boycott a company to destroy products that they already bought. Two weeks ago, before this started, Nike owned 46 percent of the market that is a hugely successful brand. Their closest competitor is Adidas followed by Under Armour, Reebok and everybody else that’s in the sports apparel industry. They can withstand some losses. In reaction to the backlash, they released a new ad which was a video featuring Kaepernik as the speaker. Let’s listen in. Those of you that are watching us on the YouTubes or on our app can actually watch it. Let’s listen in to the ad.

 

25:36: Thoughts on the Ad

 

Zachary: Thoughts on the ad? Twenty-six million people have clicked on it on YouTube alone.

 

Hal: I thought the ad was inspirational. If you’re strictly looking at the ad for the ad: listening to the words and watching the people that were flashing through there, then if you’re a person who is moved by such things, then it’s inspirational. The ad goes through people like Serena Williams that was the part about starting off in Compton and now she’s – well she’s not number one now. She won the French Open while she was pregnant.

 

Zachary:  She was two weeks ago.

 

Jennifer: Nobody can deny that Serena Williams is not an amazing tennis player.

 

Hal: The person who started off as a refugee and ended up on the national team. Each of those stories was inspirational in some manner. From a point of sacrifice, just going out and saying sacrificing everything. If you take him out of that ad, people would not have a problem with the wording: everything. I know you said sacrifice earlier, it was that sacrifice “everything” really had people just in flame because they say that he didn’t give up everything. The thing is go back to what I said earlier, not everybody is the word police. People use the word. How many times have parents looked at their kids and said, “I gave up everything.”

 

Jennifer: Word lives matter.

 

Hal: Yes, word lives matter. How many times have parents told their kids, “I’ve given up everything for you?” The kid didn’t turn around and look at them and say, “But you’re not dead. You didn’t give up everything.”

Jennifer: You did not fight for this country, mother.

 

Hal: You did not.

 

Jennifer: Do you think that Kaepernik has a right of the company of other people in the ad since you can’t take him out of the ad like you said?

 

Hal: He sacrificed in some manner, sure. Even the people within the ad as they were going through, some were shown having sacrificed things. Others, for example, they showed LeBron James. They didn’t really talk about something that he sacrificed. His was the part where it said be bigger than basketball. The young lady where it says, “Be the homecoming queen and the linebacker.” Not everybody was shown referring to sacrifice, so if you look at that, there’s no reason not to put him in the ad. There are different levels of sacrifice. Everybody knows that. It’s just a matter of going back to the controversial piece. Once it was him and everything kicked off, once he got put in that ad, everything was going to be scrutinized.

 

Jennifer: Yeah, I think that Hal makes a solid point. I think the point of contention for most people whether they realize it or not was the word “everything.” To your point, yes, there are totally different levels of sacrifice. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve actually told my son how much I’ve sacrificed: “You know what I’ve done for you. I’ve sacrificed everything.” That’s tots not true, but there are different levels of sacrifice represented in the commercial. I think the idea that he has sacrificed something, possibly his career in effort to stand up for what he believes in is absolutely true. I do think that the point that he says sacrificing everything and then it’s a close up on him. I think it doesn’t ring well to a lot of people.

 

Zachary: Right. Even in that video ad, when they came across the “sacrificing everything” that was where they showed him. That’s the controversial part which I think Nike was banking on.

 

Jennifer: Yeah because no press, even bad press, is good press, right?

 

Zachary: Since then, there has been a ton of memes that have come out because that’s how we communicate nowadays.

 

Hal: Meme culture, yes.

 

Zachary: Let’s talk about some of our favorites. My favorite meme that has come out is the one that has Ross from Friends. It says, “Just Pivot.”

 

Jennifer: It’s got a picture of Ross standing in the stairwell for those of you that are Friends’ fans feel free to giggle along with us. There’s a picture of Ross standing in an entryway to his apartment building. He’s holding a couch. It says “Pivot” in really big letters across his face. It’s all black and white and dramatic. Then at the very bottom with the swoosh or the wing, it says, “Just Pivot.”

 

Zachary: We’ll have to put a clip of that show so people can understand because Hal’s like, “what are you talking about?”

 

Hal: I’ve seen that one before. I think I saw it briefly because like you said, there’s been a bunch. I saw someone online who said, “let’s just start an entire thread with nothing but Nike memes.” I skimmed down through there. Matter of fact, the funny thing was I was talking to a friend of mine totally cracking up because for me sometimes the cornier, the better. The one that had me laughing the hardest was Pootie Tang. I think the words across it were “Sine your pity on the runny kine.” Instead of “Just Do It,” it was “Sa da tay.” If you haven’t seen it, go watch the movie. It is stupid, but at least go watch it once and it will all make sense kind of like what you said with Friends.

 

Zachary: What are some of the other ones that you’ve seen?

 

Jennifer: There are just so many. I know one of the ones that I saw, this is so stupid though. There’s a cat and he’s a black cat. It’s a very dark ad as far as you know it’s black and white with big, green eyes popping out at you because it’s a black cat. It says “Scratch their faces for no reason” or something like that. Instead of “Just Do It,” it says “Just Do It.” My question is, Hal, and I’m going to ask you because I’m just curious. There are two different sides. There are people - well I guess there are three because like Zachary said, there are apathetic people.

 

Hal: Left, right, middle.

 

Jennifer: Left, right and I don’t care. There’s the side that believes strongly in what Kaepernik is trying to achieve and support his right to protest. They feel very strongly in agreement with what he’s doing. Then, there is the other side that is feeling that he is disrespecting the flag. A whole bunch of stuff is going to come out of this that is not necessarily related to this. They disagree with this whole line of advertising. Now that the memes have come out, one of the things that I find interesting is that my Facebook feed is filled with both sides of the fence. I went to school in Chicago. I graduated with a theater degree. I have a lot of liberal friends, having moved down here to Georgia and the people that I’ve met here. I have a lot of conservative friends, so I literally have a 50, 50 on my Facebook feed. I’m seeing both sides of the aisle sharing these memes, giggling about all these different things. I’m wondering if there is any particular segment of the population that gets offended that memes are being made in light of this very serious campaign that Nike is trying to put out. Colin Kaepernik is trying to. His agenda is very serious. His protest is very serious. Are we making fun of it by meme-ing it?

 

Hal:  I think that was: it might have become a coping mechanism.

 

Zachary: For both sides.

 

Hal:  For both sides because here we are everybody taking one side or the other. Well, not everybody because we have the apathetic people.

 

Jennifer: - who are still enjoying the memes.

 

Hal: - who are still enjoying the memes because I’m like you. I have a lot of liberal friends. I have a lot of conservative friends. It surprises some of my more recent friends to tell them that if you go back and look at my discussion six or seven years ago, I was arguing things from the conservative perspective. Everybody thought I was crazy.

 

Zachary: That’s because you were a business owner.

 

Hal: Yes, it happens. It was a way that all of the sudden, you had to laugh. Even with these memes popping up, people would even say, “Listen regardless of what side you’re on, this is funny.”

 

Zachary: Let’s take a break. Hear from our sponsors. When we come back, I’ll give you my closing thoughts.

 

Jennifer: You’re straight shot. You should call it your straight shot: your closing comments of the day.

36:15: Facts about Nike’s Marketing Campaign

 

Zachary: The wrap up, yeah. The straight shot about what I believe Nike was thinking and why: why they did, what they’ve done. We’ve talked a lot about opinions, so let’s state some facts. Nike has hired Wieden+Kennedy as their marketing agency. They’ve been with them for a long time. They’ve had a lot of really great success with them. I think in a nutshell of this whole thing is that this backlash was not an oversight. I think they knew exactly what was going to happen. The seemingly reactionary release of the second ad was not reactionary at all. I think that all of it has been carefully, weighed strategy. These people have been with them a long time. They know what they are doing. They know marketing. They know how to create buzz and how to take advantage of certain situations. Have you noticed that in the last thirty years, Nike’s marketing has never been about their product?

 

Jennifer: Oh my gosh.

 

Zachary: It seems strange, doesn’t it? It’s never been about the shoes themselves. It’s never been we’re made out of this type of leather or we’re stitched together with this type of technology. This manufacturing process maximizes the life of the shoe. It’s never been about that because they realized that’s not the buying point. That’s not why people are buying their shoes. Instead, their marketing is geared towards engaging the emotions of their consumers. This time they are taking it even further. Nike is banking on what Americus Reed calls Identity Loyalty. He defines it this way: it is a phenomenon that happens when buying becomes being. It’s a pretty good way to put it. Some brands have been able to become part of who you are beyond what you buy. When you’re able to do that, you have a brand ambassador which is somebody that goes out and preaches the gospel of the company. More so than just a consumer that goes out and buys things in retail. It’s something that they’re banking on. It’s a large leap for companies. Nike has been around. They have done this for a long time. This is how they are doing it this time. They’re aligning themselves with the core of several people in our country. By doing that, they are hoping to become part of who they are at the core of who they are by aligning themselves with a certain belief system. On the other side, the message of this latest ad doesn’t really stray away from what the other half of the country actually believes. Aside from using Colin Kaepernik, the message itself can be embraced: believe, believe in something. That is something that everybody regardless of who they are can really sink their teeth into and agree with. They aren’t using Kaepernik’s message. They’re using their message. After the shock wears off, the message itself is going to ring true for people. Another point is conservatives aren’t really known for destroying things that they’ve purchased. In the heat of the moment to make a point, both sides are talking loud and talking hard and making sensational videos for social media. After the shock wears off, I don’t think it’s going to be suicide for the brand. Even if it is somewhat detrimental, they do have the marketing points to spare. Until then, I think that they are going to be beating on their core audience which is made up of athletes, skate boarders, urban artists, people that are involved in social and culture-shaping movements. They know what those people are about. They’re banking on this upside by making liberals think that they support their cause in becoming part of their lives. A lot of these people love the fight. They’re in these movements. Nike has given them something to fight for or to fight with. I think that the company is also banking that conservatives will not be irrational in the end. They do still make a good product and a premium brand. In the end, they’re trusting that the conservatives will recognize that and not continue in the boycott process which is what social media has started. Generally speaking, conservatives are older. The liberals are generally a lot younger. With them being younger, they have more products to buy in the end. Overall, once you look at the whole picture, Nike isn’t really disrespecting the flag. They’re just taking advantage of an opportunity of what’s going on in our country. They’re received a lot of free press because of it. In the first week, they’ve received forty-three million dollars’ worth of media exposure.

Jennifer: They are riding the emotional wave.

 

Zachary: Exactly. You’ll hear people say there’s no such thing as bad press. There are a lot of things going on. We’ve talked about the memes that have been created. There are memes going around and people are making their own memes. All of that is free press. Whether people are saying it is brand suicide or Nike has stepped up to the plate and they’re joining this movement, whatever people are saying they are talking about it. I think in the end it’s a calculated risk. Business is still business. I don’t think that they are concerned with losing any Republicans that might take a stand against them. If they stand, it’s just going to light the fire underneath their core audience and then sell more shoes which is what the goal is. In the end, Nike is a company. They are looking to sell more shoes. Honestly, the majority of forty-year-old men aren’t buying themselves sports apparel. They’re not shaping the culture that Nike is going to benefit from in the same ways as these younger, more liberal-minded individuals are. As a successful company that has been marketing for a long time, Nike is trying to get them while they are young and raise them to be one with their brand. Plus, they just signed an eight year sponsorship deal with the NFL. They’re going to be just fine.

 

Jennifer: So, that is the Kaepernik/Nike controversy given to you straight from a marketing perspective.

 

Zachary: Yeah, give it to you straight. It’s the straight shot.

 

Jennifer: It’s the straight shot.

 

Zachary: On the next show, we are going to discuss marketing lessons that can be learned from the Discovery Channel’s recent movie biopic that they did on Harley Davidson motorcycles. That will be fun. It’s a blog series that we did a while back. It’s got such good information in it that we’re going to discuss it here on Straight Shot.

 

Jennifer: Can’t wait.

 

Zachary: That will be fun, so until then we will see you guys later. Have a great rest of your week.

 

Jennifer: Bye now.

 

 

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Category :  Straight Shot Marketing Podcast