Date: To: From:  Re:

10/17/01 Dr. David Chappell Marc Sabelli Annotated Bibliography

 Nike, Inc.

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Internet Sources:
 
 

1. The Invention Dimension - http://web.mit.edu/invent/www/inventorsA-H/inventor_week.html- This site provides information as to how Nike got started as it profiles CEO of Nike, Phil Knight. It has great information about the history of the company and the innovations of Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight. The site itself is only a brief profile of Knight but gives insight as to how entrepreneurship and innovation can take a company to the next level and set precedents for others to follow in the shoe industry.  Phil Knight was a business major at the University of Oregon and an avid track runner. He and his coach, Bill Bowerman, were dissatisfied with the quality of American running shoes and decided to open up their own company together in 1964. The goal of their company was to market a lighter running shoe that was more comfortable and designed by Bowerman. In 1968, they changed the name of their company to Nike and began to sell their shoes at track meets throughout Western US. Through hard work and experimentation, these two entrepreneurs took the shoe industry by storm. Because of their innovation, and their crafty advertising, they shot putted Nike into the head of the shoe industry and ages ahead of their rivals.  Back to top

 

2. Kevin's Nike Page- http://www.orc.ca/~jkelly/kevin/nike/main2.htm - This is a great source for information about Nike. There are a number of links, images, and a detailed history of the Swoosh as well as the company. It provides a number of different images depicting the heart of Nike and a number of useful links to other great Nike web pages.  Caroline Davidson designed the swoosh in 1971 for a grand total amount of $35.00. The swoosh represents the wing of the Greek Goddess Nike, for whom the company was named after. Caroline was an advertising student at Portland State University and met Phil Knight when he was teaching accounting classes. He asked her to design a logo of some sort that could be placed on the side of a shoe and in 1972 the first shoe with a swoosh was introduced and the fascination that is Nike began from there.  Back to top

 

3. Boycott Nike Home Page- http://www.saigon.com/~nike/- This is obviously a site that opposes Nike because of their labor practices in Vietnam and other asian countries. This site gives insight about Nike labor practices overseas and the many abuses that many people who work in these factories incur. It also calls for a plan of action against Nike to boycott them and fax them complaints about their unfair labor practices.  This site talks about Thuy and Lap, two Vietnamese women workers at a Nike factory that were physically abused by their bosses to meet a certain quota for the day. It also tells of other horror stories that have reached the front page of such distinguished papers as USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times. Phil Knight has done nothing to improve factory conditions overseas. Instead, he has gone to great measures by beefing up his public relations department to try and pull the wool over everyone's eyes. This protest is worldwide and there are many organizations against Nike. Some of these organizations include: Press for Change, the National Labor Committee, Global Exchange, National Organization of Women, and Community Aid Abroad. Not all of these organizations, however, support a boycott on Nike.  Back to top

 

4. Phil Knight--CEO of Nike-http://www.godie.nu/nike/ceo.htm - This site provides information about the financial standings of Phil Knight. It isn't a very big site but has a lot of his earnings and bonuses in the past few years. It is quite an interesting site because it seems as if the person who designed the site is not a fan of Phil Knight and even goes so far as to give out an address and phone number where you can reach him.  Phil Knight is worth 5.8 billion dollars which puts him on the map as the 13th richest man in the world. The value alone of the stock he held in 1995 was worth 4.5 billion dollars. The fourth quarter dividend earnings for Phil Knight in 1997 was 80 million dollars. This is just a sample of how much money Nike has coming in and out on a yearly basis.  Back to top

 

5. NikeBiz- http://www.nikebiz.com/ - This site provides information about Nike's new Corporate Responsibility Report. It gives a full article describing the objectives that Nike hopes to fulfill in the future. This site also gives access to the actual full report that Nike released to its employees. This is a good site because it gives insight into the goals of Nike and where they are hoping to go in the future.  Nike released its first corporate report to try and communicate to people how their business is run. It talks about working towards sustainable goals, environmental being the most important. They hope to reduce the climate impact by reducing factory waste from production and increasing recycling efforts. They also want to improve the labor compliance and see that all of their workers worldwide have favorable wages and good working conditions.  Back to top

 

6. NikeWatch- http://www.caa.org.au/campaigns/nike/ - This is yet another site that is against the labor treatments of Nike factory workers overseas in Asian factories. This site provides reports and analysis of unfavorable factory conditions and needed reforms. It also gives information pertaining to news updates about current situations. There is a debate with Nike and an urge for action for people who visit the site to get involved. This site provides a lot of interesting information about the labor treatment of Nike laborers in factory contracts overseas, mostly in Asia. This site is sponsored by a group called NikeWatch who are actively involved in trying to reform Nike's unfavorable factory conditions worldwide. This site claims that workers in Nike contract factories are still required today to work 60 hour weeks and are harassed or threatened with their job if they refuse to work the overtime. Though Nike is paying the minimum or slightly above in all countries, this is still not sufficient for a family to live off of in certain areas like Indonesia and only provides the family with what is equivalent to $2.00 US dollars a day.  Back to top

 

7. Exposing Nike Sweatshops- http://www.corpwatch.org/trac/nike/ - This site is a report published by Corpwatch trying to expose to the world sweatshops that Nike has overseas. This site offers tons of information about various headlines in papers about Nike sweatshops to new policies by Nike that failed to mention anything about a livable wage. The site is very informative and has a lot of different links and articles to go through and learn about Nike's factories overseas and the conditions therein.  Corporate Watch and TRAC, which stands for the Transnational Resource and Action Center,  are two organizations that have set out to try and make Nike improve conditions in Vietnam and Mexico in their factories. These two organizations have exposed Nike to the public and have successfully gotten them to pledge to end child labor and allow non governmental agencies to participate in the monitoring of its Asian factories. These two organizations are not just striking out against Nike, but against all garment and shoe manufacturers that deny human rights and environmental justice. There have been recent investigations in Nike factories located in Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, and China and it was discovered in Indonesia that Nike workers don't even make enough to support their basic needs.  Back to top

 

8. Nike Financial Statements- http://www.ste2000.org/math/graph.htm - This site provides the income reports for Nike for the years 1996, 1997, and 1998. This gives information about how the company is doing financially and gives true numbers of revenues and expenses for these three years. This is helpful because it gives you insight into the money coming in and out in the business in a years time and how it changes from year to year. The income statement is a very useful financial statement when making business decisions. There is a noticeable fluctuation in the net income from year to year. In 1996, the company had a net income of $553,190,000.00. Then Nike went above and beyond in 1997 with a net income of $795,800,000.00, but fell back in income in 1997 with a mere $399,600,000.00 of net income. These numbers and the decrease in 1998 can be traced back to the controversy that Nike got into with the unfair labor practices in their overseas factories. Looking at the fluctuation of the price of a common share from $1.88 in 1996 to $2.76 in 1997 to $1.38 in 1998, I would not invest in Nike stock because of my conservative nature.  Back to top

 

9. Vault Reports for Nike- http://www.vaultreports.com/companies/searchcompanies.jsp?keyword=nike - This site gives an inside look at Nike and the atmosphere in its headquarters in Oregon. It also provides a brief history about the company without any biased information. This site also gives insight from insiders in the company as to how to get a job with them and other useful information.  The Vault has insiders in the Nike company in Oregon referring to their working environment as "the campus" because of the activities that go on during a typical workday. There are always pick up games of football or soccer or any sport of Nike's nature going on periodically throughout the day. The Vault also looks at aspects of how to land a job with Nike. Insiders provide their thoughts on the subject and feel that desire for Nike and enthusiasm for what they are doing are two of the biggest factors of landing a job with Nike. The Vault also touches on the issues of sweat shops in overseas Nike factories and what Nike is trying to do to improve those unfavorable conditions.  Back to top

 

10. Phil Knight- The Force Behind Nike- http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/1997/janfeb/articles/knight.html - This site provides information on Phil Knight and how he brought Nike greatness  to a mediocre company, known as Blue Ribbon Sports. There is a lot of background information about how he used his innovation and wit in creative advertising to spring Nike to greatness and a level that is yet to be touched by the rest of the shoe industry. This site also outlines the many great athletes that Knight has managed to sign to endorse Nike products.  Phil Knight has always been such a controversial person to the world. He has made more money from Nike athletic products than anyone in the industry, ever. He is ranked sixth on Forbe's latest list of the richest Americans with a net worth of $5.3 billion. He is a matter of controversy because of his self-contained attitude. He is so mysterious because he shuns publicity and self explication. He was once dubbed as the "most powerful man in sports" by the Sporting News,  a title that many feel he doesn't live up to personally but without a doubt does professionally.  Back to top

Library Sources:
 
 

11. Business and Industry - "New Arrival," FN. 57(39) p.16. September 24, 2001 http://rave.ohiolink.edu/databases/login/bsin Nike is treading into a new market and is trying to conquer yet another industry, that being in maternity wear. Nike has teamed up with Liz Lange to create a product line consisting of workout clothes, yoga garbs with tops and bottoms, all aimed at pregnant women. There has not been any plans, however, for any footwear line to come out because Nike believes that they already have a shoe that provides extra support and flexibility in the Presto.  Nike has always shown innovation and entrepreneurship in their business strategies and it has almost always led to success. Nike expects to be very successful in their new conquest because pregnant women still want to stay as physically fit as they can. There is no better logo that describes physical fitness than Nike so their maternity line should be a success.  Back to top

 

12. RDS Suite - "Nike Tennessee Breaks Throughput Record," Material Handling Management, 56 (8): 53, August 2001. ISSN: 0025-5262, http://search.rdsinc.com/sessions?userid=ohiobamp&products=BMP This article talks about how  Nike Tennessee Inc., a division of Nike Inc. out of Oregon, increased its throughput at the distribution center by purchasing some new equipment and being as efficient as human error can allow. The purchase of the new equipment was a good choice on their part because they not only increased their throughput, but they actually doubled it. Productivity has increased by 60% so far.  The article also covers multitasking. They implemented the new equipment into their everyday business activity without breaking stride. They decided to stay with the same company, Mathews, that had provided them with equipment before and had an idea of their system and set up, which could only help with the transition and set up of the new equipment.  Back to top

 

13. RDS Suite - "Nike: Just Does It," Brandmarketing, VII (12): 40-47, December 2000. ISSN: 1091-6962  http://search.rdsinc.com/sessions?userid=ohiobamp&products=BMP This article provides information on a not so favorable ad campaign they released about their ACG Air DriGoat shoes. Nike made some blunt comments regarding handicapped people. The campaign stated: "Right about now you're probably asking yourself, 'How can a trail running shoe with an outer sole designed like a goat's hoof help me avoid compressing my spinal cord into a Slinky on the side of some unsuspecting conifer. Thereby rendering me a drooling, misshapen non-extreme-trail running husk of my former self. Forced to roam the earth in a motorized wheel chair with my name, embossed on one of those cute little license plates you get at carnivals or state fairs, fastened to the back?'" People took offense to this campaign because of the description of people with disabilities as drooling and misshapen, as you can see with the underlined words above.  Nike did not mean to offend people intentionally and in no way meant to refer to the disabled like that. It is just this bluntness and self-determination that has built Nike into the overpowering industry it is today. They have always ignored the doubters and went and did things their way, usually pushing the boundaries all the way.    Back to top

14.Lexis Nexis Provides the convenience of the Internet and the accurateness of Lexis Nexis to efficiently and effectively retrieve documents that meet accurate research needs. Lexis Nexis allows access to variety of topics including news, business, legal, medical, and reference information. Click here to view a source list of all publications covered by the index. A. "The Associated Press and Legal Wire," Business News, October 9, 2001.  Nike released its first corporate responsibility report on Tuesday which is an assembled, comprehensive public review of their corporate responsibility practices. The corporate responsibility report makes the company more transparent, meaning that they are more open as to how they are running their business. They hope to give insights into their business about how it is run and why they have been so successful. B. "EFE News Service," Business News, October 2, 2001. Italian soccer star Ronaldo admitted that he has a clause in his contract with Nike that says that he has to be a permanent member of his national team and cannot be off of the team for more than two years. His deadline was on Oct. 9, 2001 because his last national appearance with the Italy team was Oct. 9, 1999. The clause exists but Ronaldo is optimistic in his thinking that Nike will not follow through with the stipulation.  Back to top

 

15. ABI Inform - "Nike-cam shows happy workers," Asian Business. v37n9 Sep 2001. p.55, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/databases/login/abig This article is about Nike responding to the allegations of them running sweat shops in their overseas factory contracts. The article provides a different aspect as to what goes on in Nike factory contracts as seen through the eyes of Nike instead of through outside organizations. The main point of the article is about a 12 minute streaming video that Nike has on their web site inside a factory in Vietnam. There are also scenes from Thailand and China as well. The video was set up to be like a tour of the factory contract with Dusty Kidd as the tour guide. In the video it shows a lot of happy Asians in a clean workplace and the heart of Nike, the swoosh, painted on the wall with their logo "Just Do It". Nike is trying to show with this video that they provide people who work for them overseas in factory contracts with a clean working environment with fresh air and sometimes free food and other accommodations.    Back to top

 

16. Business and Industry - "Waiting to Exhale," FN 57(36) p.20. September 03, 2001  http://rave.ohiolink.edu/databases/login/bsin - This article discusses the odd pairing of Nike and Cole Haan. Nike is obviously athletics and Cole Haan is loafers. The combination is called the Air Collection and has been a hit so far for both men and women, proving that an unlikely partnership can be a successful partnership. The collection is targeted towards the younger, more designer aware consumer.  The popularity of this line is incredible, with the retail accounts of the men's Air Line representing 18 percent of customer business on average. The remarks coming from Gordon Thompson, the creative director for Cole Haan, were right on with the ongoing theme throughout this report. He said that the best part of working with Nike is that the Cole Haan shoes will have the latest innovation because of Nike's presence in the shoe industry.  Back to top