The Gym Shoe Phenomenon: Social Values vs. Marketability
The Gym Shoe Phenomenon: Social Values vs. Marketability
GAIL BAKER
University of Florida
Sprinkled between the abandoned burned-out buildings and the glass-covered vacant lots of Chicago’s South Side are bigger-than-life billboards featuring famous athletes wearing expensive Nike gym shoes. Basketball superstar Michael Jordan claims he can jump higher while wearing the shoes; former football great Bo Jackson boasts he can run faster in Nike athletic shoes. Controversial movie director Spike Lee says people of different backgrounds would get along better wearing good athletic shoes.
The company is excited about the “Air Jordan” and “Bo Knows” athletic shoe campaigns it developed for the African-American market. And to ensure that the campaigns are sensitive to African-American consumers, Nike hired legendary GeorgetownUniversity basketball coach John Thompson as a $200,000-a-year consultant.
In addition, Nike is careful to select only athletes with “squeaky clean” reputations. Neither Jordan nor Jackson has ever been involved in drugs. Both are family men who are active in their communities. The company believes these two men can clearly be considered role models for the African-American youths who see, hear and read the advertisements. It is thought that these celebrities add credibility to the product and enhance the image of the expensive shoes, which cost between $50 and $125 a pair.
Back in the Chicago ghetto, a 16-year-old black youth is shot and killed on his way to school. Police surmise that he is murdered for his $125 gym shoes, the only clothing missing from his bloody body when the authorities arrive. Unfortunately, this is not the first case of assault or murder provoked by a pair of expensive shoes. Because they have become so fashionable and because they are so expensive, innercity children are robbing and killing each other to look more like the athletic celebrities they wish to emulate.
Some gangs name themselves after the shoes and shave the name into their haircuts. Parents sometimes sacrifice necessities to purchase the shoes for their children. The popularity of the shoes and the violence that is sometimes associated with them is noticed by leaders in the African-American community. Nike is criticized in the media for selecting black athletes as spokespersons. Eric Perkins of the Educational Testing Service calls the use of black athletes “exploitative, because advertisers are playing into the subliminal fascination with black superiority in the white collective psyche.” Others criticize Nike for what they believe to be a lack of minority hiring and black community support. Nike is also accused of promoting athletics over academics. Only one in 10,000 high school athletes ever becomes a professional, and only 20 percent of all black college athletes ever finish college.
Jesse Jackson and other religious and civil rights leaders call for a national boycott of Nike to protest the company’s business practices. Reverend Jackson is particularly critical of the African Americans who endorse athletic shoes, saying, “They are exploiting an ethos of mindless materialism.” Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity), a civil rights organization founded by Reverend Jackson, joins the boycott effort. PUSH officials complain that sales of Nike shoes to blacks total $200 million annually, while the companyhas no high-ranking black executives and does not do business with black-ownedadvertising agencies. The company responds by saying that sales to nonwhites accountfor only 14 percent of its sales. Nike also states that 7.5 percent of its 4,200U.S. employees are black.
Fourteen weeks into the boycott, the Rev. Tyrone Crider, executive director ofOperation PUSH, says the boycott would continue “until Nike decides to put moneyin black-owned banks, advertise with black-owned media, do business with blackownedbusinesses, and put a black on its board of directors.”On the other side of the issue, Nike spokespersons say it is just good marketingto use Bo Jackson and Michael Jordan in their advertisements. “He [Jackson] is aperson kids can look up to. He’s crazy about his kids and his wife and family. He’ssomebody who has applied himself and came from a really humble background,”says Melinda Gable, public relations executive for Nike.
Jordan, Lee and Thompson meet with Jackson in an effort to stop the boycott.The meeting is unsuccessful and the boycott continues.
Nike announces during the boycott that it will hire a minority vice president andname a minority to its board of directors by 1992. The company also hires a minorityadvertising agency, Muse Codero and Chen, out of Los Angeles, to handle a portionof its account.Nike shoe sales, unaffected by the boycott, increase 58 percent over the sameperiod the previous year. After several months and a number of news articles and televisionstories, the Nike boycott fades from the national headlines and Nike continuesits use of black athletes in its advertising campaigns. Inner-city crime continues,but few news reports link the violence to clothing or shoes.
Following the boycott, the company develops a “Bo Knows School” campaignfeaturing Jackson and distributes thousands of book jackets to inner-city schools. Onit Jackson appears in a graduation cap and gown, a band uniform, a scientist’s whitelab coat, and a Greek philosopher’s toga. The book jacket reads, “Bo knows all thisstuff because he stayed in school.”Although the company now receives applause for its interest in education, criticsstill question the tie-in with African-American athletes.
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