Nike's Online Sales Skyrocketed After Unveiling Kaepernick Ad Campaign
It's been a week since Nike announced the face of the thirtieth anniversary of its "Just Do It" campaign would be Colin Kaepernick. Surprising no one, the backlash arrived swiftly, with disgruntled white men setting their shoes on fire and defiantly chopping off the tops of their socks. People who are personally offended by Kaepernick's protest against police brutality even scrambled for a white athlete they could point to as more deserving, and for at least the second time they settled on Pat Tillman despite his family's explicit request that they knock it off.
Of course, there's nothing wrong with boycotts. They're an effective and time-tested way for people to exert power when they lack political influence. And for a moment, it seemed like mutilating socks and disrespecting widows was actually working, as Nike's stock dipped early in the week. But this victory for the sneaker-burners was short-lived. By Tuesday, Nike's online sales had jumped 31 percent (compared with 17 percent the year before during the same time period) and by the end of the week Nike had more than regained the drop in its stock. How does Nike account for this? According to MarketWatch:
Nike’s most engaged audience persona is “Made it and Know it,” said 4C Chief Marketing Officer Aaron Goldman, one of 70 categories of consumers that 4C has identified by analyzing social-media engagement on a range of platforms. People in that bracket are generally successful in their careers and personal lives, are typically single with robust social lives, and like to spend money on entertainment and travel, as well as online streaming services.
“Racial equality is a top concern for this audience, along with causes like clean-water access and gun control,” Goldman said.
4C also found that positive perception of Kaepernick was up by the week's end. So Nike clearly wasn't betting on the demographics of consumers that were likely to destroy products they already paid for just to send a message—you know, the type of folks who throw Keurig machines off of balconies to show solidarity with a conspiracy-peddler accused of being a slumlord. And as a bonus, getting Kaepernick as a spokesman preemptively keeps Nike from dealing with Nazi endorsements like the ones New Balance got late in 2016.
Of course, the prime motivation for Nike, for every corporation, is profit. They no doubt calculated the impact of negative reactions and determined that they either weren't costly enough to change course or that they actually would serve to drive sales. Either way, those numbers are the top concern, not police brutality nor the sensibilities of people furious over black athletes protesting it. As a business decision, for now it looks like it was the smart move.
