In 1996, the Olympic Games were held in Atlanta city of America. Players sweated a lot on the field and some won gold and many silver and bronze medals. There was a war going on between the players inside the field, but outside the field there was also a war going on between two big sports companies. This was a fight for identity, fame and to rule the market. This match was Reebok vs Nike. Reebok had declared itself ‘Official Olympic Sponsor’ by paying a huge amount of 50 million dollars. He felt that the audience would go crazy about Reebok. But you will be surprised to know that after the Olympics were over, most of the spectators felt that Nike was the real sponsor. Imagine, what an amazing game Nike would have created. This whole story is a bit long, but it is very interesting.
After securing official Olympic sponsorship, Reebok officials were sure that their gold medal was now certain. Their logo will be everywhere, every athlete will wear their kit, and this deal will make them the king of the market overnight. Nike’s entry comes just before the game officially starts. Nike did not pay a single penny to sponsor the Olympics. His game was going to start not with money, but with brains and courage.
The magic of Marketing Head and his team
Nike’s marketing head and his team were sitting in a corner, smiling. A plan was brewing in his mind, which in the world of marketing is called Ambush Marketing. Nike stole all the glory from Reebok by signing a $50 million deal without securing a single sponsorship, and changed the rules of marketing forever.
At that time, Nike founder Phil Knight and his team were well aware that just making shoes or sponsoring athletes would no longer suffice. The market now demands not just performance, but the story and emotion behind the performance. Nike also did not start like any big company. Phil Knight was formerly a mid-distance runner at the University of Oregon. He often imported and sold Japanese shoes cheaply. His starting capital was just $500, and his first office was the trunk of his car. His journey was full of struggles. Nike had somehow established itself as a brand, but a lot was still to be achieved.
The Nike team always knew that their real strength lay not in their Swoosh logo, but in their slogan of Just Do It. A slogan which awakens the spirit to do something not just in sports but also in life.
Reebok had to be defeated without breaking the rules.
The stakes were huge in 1996. Olympics! The world’s largest sports platform. Reebok had bought all the legal and official places. They had the right to use the official logo of the Olympics. The challenge before Nike was how to beat the official sponsor, without breaking any rules.
This was the turning point, which forced the Nike team to think awake overnight. There was Olympic excitement everywhere in the city of Atlanta. The Nike team noted that even though they couldn’t advertise inside the stadium, they owned the entire city outside the stadium. City roads, buses, buildings, even seating areas for spectators.
The Nike team decided that if they could not sponsor the event, then they would sponsor the ‘stars’ of that event. At that time Michael Johnson was the biggest superstar of track and field. He was expected to win gold in both 200 meters and 400 meters. The Nike team designed a masterpiece that no one had imagined.
Nike gave a special kind of racing spike shoe to Michael Johnson. This was no ordinary shoe. It was a completely gold colored shoe. It cost $30,000 and was very light, built just for Michael Johnson. When Michael Johnson came on the track for the 400 meter race, the world was stunned to see the shining gold shoes on his feet.
Johnson won the race, broke the world record, and as he stood with the medal around his neck and gold shoes on his feet, every flashlight of the camera was falling on the Nike logo. Within a few days, Michael Johnson was on the cover of TIME magazine with his gold medal and gold shoes. Crores of people saw those golden shoes on TV, in newspapers and on magazine covers. The Nike logo was associated with the gold medal without any official sponsorship. This was just the beginning. Nike’s strategy was like a ‘siege’. There was still a lot to come.
You don’t win silver, you win gold!
Nike bought every big billboard in the city of Atlanta. Nike ads appeared around the Olympic venues and athletes’ villages, wherever media and spectators frequented them. They did not use the Olympic logo in the advertisements, but their message was clear – You don’t win silver, you lose gold. This meant that if someone wins a silver medal, the truth is that he has lost the gold medal. He could have won gold. This slogan immediately went viral.
Nike Village at the root of Olympic Village
The center of the Olympic Games is the stadium and athlete village, where Reebok had taken control in every way. But the Nike team thought, “If we can’t go inside, why not build our center outside?” He rented a huge space in downtown Atlanta, just 100 meters away from the Olympic Village and the main media center. This place was so big that looking at it it seemed as if a small fun fair or sports theme park was being built.
He named this temporary campus ‘Nike Village’. This was not an ordinary store where shoes were sold. It was a high-tech, entertainment-packed hub designed specifically for athletes and the media. Nike made many things available here, which were not even available in Reebok’s official centers at that time, for example-
- Recovery Zone: State-of-the-art gym, massage and relaxation facilities for athletes.
- Interview Area: Press conference rooms with beautiful and attractive backgrounds for media.
- Fun Activity: Food and drink facilities, open courts for basketball and games.
Nike-sponsored superstar athletes (such as Michael Johnson, Carl Lewis, etc.) held their press conferences in ‘Nike Village’ instead of attending official press conferences hosted by Reebok. The media knew that if they wanted to talk to the biggest stars of the Olympics and get good photos, they would have to go to Nike Village.
The result was that even though the news of the Olympics was coming from the stadium, the ‘centre’ of those news had become Nike Village. Journalists spent hours at Nike Village, covering activities there, and inadvertently made the Nike logo and atmosphere a part of their coverage. Even without paying the $50 million sponsorship fee, Nike impressed upon the media and spectators that the real spirit of the Olympics lies in the Nike Village.
Nike secretly made thousands of flags and banners with its logo. He employed his employees and some people, who used to go into the crowd and distribute these flags to the spectators. When the camera zoomed in on the audience, the Nike logo was inadvertently visible to millions of people on TV.
Nike won, sales boomed
Reebok was surprised. He had spent 50 million dollars, but Nike was being talked about everywhere. The survey revealed that 22 percent people in America believed that Nike is the official sponsor of the Olympics, while only 16 percent people recognized Reebok as the true sponsor. Overall, Nike defeated Reebok.
After this ‘ambush marketing’, there was a huge jump of 22 percent in Nike’s sales. Nike not only defeated one brand, but it also taught the marketing industry that now the rules of sponsorship have changed. Brand identity is not formed only by money, but by emotion and understanding of the occasion. Nike made itself a symbol of ‘the struggle and triumph of every athlete’, rather than just a company that sells shoes.
