Nike Swot Analysis

SWOT analysis: Nike

Introduction

Like most companies, Nike has corporate strengths and weaknesses. However, in the 50 years that Nike has been in business, it has weathered most challenges. From its maverick days as an upstart sports shoe brand being sold out of the back of the trunk of its owners’ cars at track meets, through the 80s and 90s when it lavished multi-million dollar endorsement deals on sports icons.
Following is a SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunity and threat) analysis of this great American business enterprise.

Strengths:

Marketing expertise

Nike is a marketing trailblazer. Its commercials are so unique and iconic that every new advertising campaign is analysed by industry watchers and experts, and reviewed like it is a new novel or bestseller (Howell, 1991). It has produced gems such as “Just Do It”, the “most recognizable tagline in advertising history” (Katz, 1994), and “No games. Just sport” – a no nonsense rallying cry immortalized in the 2000 movie “What Women Want” starring Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt.
Air Jordans – its Air Jordan line has been so successful that more than 10 years after Michael Jordan has retired from professional sports, the line continues to be Nike’s premier brand (Strasser, 1994).

Innovative product

Its very first hit, the “waffle soles” for running shoes made Nike its first millions. It was inspired by Phil Knight’s wife’s pancake waffle iron (Strasser, 1994). It combined maximum traction, simplicity of design and minimum weight. It has been copied by competitors but never duplicated.

Innovative service

Nike recognized early on the power of e-commerce. It established its Nike website to assist its worldwide fan base, allow them to ask questions, design their own shoes, and order shoes directly from the factory (Dworkin, 1999). There was practIcally no e-commerce in 1995, but in 1997 this segment earned businesses $26 billion.   By 2002, it explode into a $330 billion industry and $1... [continues]

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