(A) personalized corporate culture

"Sports, expression and free and easy sportsmanship" is the personalized corporate culture pursued by Nike. This distinctive corporate culture, an anti-traditional corporate image, was created by Philip, the founder of the company. Knight founded it.

Nike was founded as a blue ribbon sporting goods company, which was based on a paper written by Knight when he was studying in stanford graduate school of business. Knight randomly collected the ideas of some famous track and field athletes and sports fans and wrote them in the article. They have the same goal in mind: to beat Adidas and let more and more athletes wear high-quality and low-cost running shoes made in Japan-Tigers.

As the founder of the company, Knight put endless personal struggle and business ethics throughout the company's operation. Yes, Knight's enthusiasm for sporting goods was only worn away after he was selected into the track and field team of the University of Oregon and became a professional middle-distance runner. Later, I worked as an accountant in price waterhouse in Poland for five years, and my business sense was cultivated at that time. Oregon legendary track and field coach Bill? Bauer always orders running shoes for his star athletes. He told Knight that a track and field team is composed of individual players, and everyone must constantly strive to improve their performance. The creed of track and field athletes is "endless." Price waterhouse's revelation is that "business behavior has the most basic principles". Nike's history is a process of continuous dialogue between the above two creeds, and a process of coordination between athletes' personal struggle spirit and commercial constraints. Knight and Ballman co-founded Blue Ribbon, which was renamed Nike on 1972. Since then, it began to design shoes with the company's trademark and produce them in Asia.

Endless is Nike's corporate culture. At that time, Adidas, Puma and Tiger dominated the sports shoes market in the United States. In the early 1970s, jogging craze gradually rose, and millions of people began to wear sports shoes, because sports shoes are not only comfortable to wear, but also a symbol of health and youth-this is the image that most people yearn for, and sports shoes are about to become popular, but the "iron triangle" led by Adidas failed to grasp this development trend, and "Nike" crashed in. From 65438 to 0974, coach Ballman fiddled with a polyurethane rubber in the iron mold for baking waffles and made a new type of sole. This kind of sole is a "walnut cookie" type with small rubber round nails, which is more elastic than other soles popular in the market. This seemingly simple product innovation promoted Knight's career, and the product quickly opened the market. The sales window of Nike 1976 has soared from $8.3 million in the previous year to $0/40,000. Nike developed like wildfire, and the company spent a lot of money to develop new styles of running shoes. By the end of 1970s, Nike had nearly 65,438+000 researchers, many of whom had degrees in biology, chemistry, experimental biology, engineering technology, industrial design, chemistry and various related leaders. This powerful research force has developed 140 products with different styles, many of which are the most novel and technologically advanced in the market. These styles are designed according to different foot types, weights, running speeds, training plans, gender and different technical levels. These products with different styles, different prices and multiple uses have attracted thousands of runners, making them feel that Nike is the most comprehensive manufacturer of running shoes, and millions of runners with various abilities have this idea, which is a very attractive image in a developing industry.

Relying on the never-ending corporate philosophy, by 1979, Nike had achieved 33% market share by planning the launch of new products and vigorously promoting them, and finally squeezed into the "iron triangle" built by Adidas, Puma and Tiger, becoming a sales star. By 198 1, its market share even reached 50%, far ahead of Adidas, and Knight himself ran into Forbes magazine's dream list of the 400 richest people in the United States. Nike is a pioneering company with adventurous spirit. In the lush Oregon company, a well-designed culture has been cultivated. A senior manager of Nike once recalled: "It was like working in an environment full of brotherhood. Colleagues drink happily together, talk endlessly about sports, and claim to be positive and anti-traditional people. " Every six months, Knight's management team meets to discuss strategy. This noisy party is called tit for tat. Knight always encourages confrontation, even confrontation. Like everyone else, he accepts loud accusations from others. The location of Nike enterprise, just like campus, has forests, jogging tracks, lakes and football fields. Knight hopes to create a peaceful working environment. He thinks that the world is chaotic enough, and working hours should be as free as at home.

Nike's distinctive corporate culture attracts a large number of young people, and 40% of Nike employees are under 30 years old. Their day's work is arranged like this. At noon, they exercise in the sports and leisure center in the "campus" for two hours, and then work until evening. They are very loyal to the company. Nike's management is not rigorous, but we must break the firm belief of Adidas and unite the whole team. The company's marketing staff said: "We can instinctively judge what Nike will do and what Nike will not do." Because Adidas belongs to orthodoxy, Nike can attach great importance to recognizing those athletes who hate orthodoxy, such as Steve, Prafontein and Zhan Mu in track and field. The dean sneered at the amateur athletes' Federation; Like awkward Yilei? Nastase is a creepy figure in tennis. After these anti-traditional athletes were funded by Nike, Nike was full of the image of challenging orthodoxy and enterprising vitality. Knight is as passionate about the company he founded as he is about his children. He goes in and out of the office every day as long as he thinks it is necessary. Nate spends most of his time in a small room next to the office. There are dirty clothes on the floor of the hut, beside which are piles of things and papers, and almost no one else enters his house. Knight complained, "once people are allowed into your house, they will come in and out all day, and what I need is thinking."

With its entrepreneurial spirit, Nike had better finally beat Adidas in the American market. However, when Reebok became its main competitor in the early 1980s, Nike's culture of focusing on producing men's sports products was short-sighted. Nike failed to foresee the importance of soft leather non-slip shoes favored by women. 1986, Reebok surpassed Nike and became the industry leader. Inspired by this, Knight formulated management rules to support the central work of maintaining trademark reputation. 198 1, and began to carry out new transformation within the company. He divided a large footwear department into several smaller departments, each of which was responsible for a kind of sports shoes, thus speeding up the process of product development. He set up the company as a whole by establishing a production, sales and advertising system. Therefore, Qi Xin, the company, cooperated to develop all kinds of shoes, and created a powerful and sensational image for Nike shoes through advertising.

(B) The driving force of marketing strategy innovation comes from the innovation of cultural ideas.

It is the company's strategic goal to create a perfect and dynamic corporate and product image. Knight believes that teenagers have strong imitation ability and are extremely sensitive to brands. The clothes of celebrities on campus often become the objects of imitation. Therefore, as long as we try our best to make the most attractive athletes wear Nike, we will certainly attract a large number of people from all over the country to imitate it. Jordan, the greatest world-class star, has excellently grasped Nike's unique spiritual temperament, that is, the perfect and energetic work style. By sponsoring the "First Flying Man", Nike has also become the idol of millions of athletes. Now Nike has become a big company with sales of $4 billion, and its anti-traditional image is being threatened. A business critic reprimanded: "Knight found that Nike is rapidly becoming a lightning rod for the general ambivalence caused by the combination of business and sports in the United States." Knight himself thinks: "When your family business is getting bigger and bigger, you must pay attention to cooling the business, but don't put out the fire." In the United States, although every three pairs of sports shoes are sold, there is a pair of trademark Swooshk marked with Nike, but the analysis shows that as of May 3, 1994, the total financial income of Nike will drop by 6% to 3.7 billion dollars. The biggest basketball shoes sales market has also fallen sharply. The most important and promising markets for Nike are Europe and Japan, but the economies of these two countries are not so prosperous.

The core of the problem is that the consumers who have promoted the development of Nike in the past few years-teenagers and the younger generation in their early twenties-have given up their travel shoes one after another, and they are tired of shoes advertisements filled with athletes. They are looking for new and less commercial products-similar to rough leather shoes. All this has affected Nike's stock. The stock price peaked in June 1990 1 1, and fell by 40% in June 1992. 35% of Knight's stock, once worth $2.3 billion, is now only worth1300 million. Many analysts believe that Nike has reached its lowest point. They estimate that in 195, Nike's profit will rise to 12%, which is about 3160,000 USD. Although it still lags behind the profit of 1992 fiscal year, the 3/4 results released on March 15 let Wall Street find the signs of the good news they have been looking for. Orders have improved in the summer months, and new styles-including the new series of basketball shoes-will be welcomed by retailers. However, the 56-year-old chairman of Nike is still worried, knowing that it is impossible to achieve the growth he once created again in the saturated American market. He spent a lot of time thinking about two things; How can we achieve the above goals without losing the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship that is crucial to the success of the company? Knight is inscrutable and withdrawn.

To achieve the company's goals, the reform of corporate culture is imperative. Nate hasn't asked about Nike's daily affairs for months. In order to cope with the uncontrollable situation of the company, Knight once again participated in the company's decision-making. That's exactly what happened. Nike is interested in Chris, the head of the department. Van Dyke said, "Nate's back." In mid-February, the Chairman convened a meeting of 365,438+0 senior managers in Oregon Beach Villa, including 8 overseas branch managers. He announced at the meeting that in June this year, Clark, 42, will succeed President Chad, 66? Donahue. This new appointment has won the general support of the whole company. It fully affirmed Clark's ability to learn from others by strengthening communication, and also built a big stage for Nike, a "laggard". But this new strategy needs the full cooperation of all departments of Nike. At a middle management meeting, President Keweike explained the importance of "cooperative management mode" to 60 managers. Knight didn't like meetings at ordinary times, but he sat in the back row and attended the meeting. Clark said that Nike has not done enough to make communication channels smoother and speed up decision-making. "We have a sense of cooperation in our genes," he concluded, "but the days when some people gathered in the hall to make decisions are gone forever." Nate listened patiently until Clark invited the unexpected guest to the front desk. He is wearing a double-breasted suit and a pair of worn flat shoes. Nate looks a little disheveled. He walked slowly down the aisle. His dim eyes narrowed when the light shone on him. He used jokes to emphasize the importance of communication channels: "A few days ago, Sean? A frog walks into a bar upstairs in Eckhardt. The bartender asks, "What's that?" The frog replied, "I don't know." At first, it was just a sarcoma growing on the ass. "Knight's message to managers through jokes is that we must succeed, but we must not lose our sense of humor and our rebellious culture. In the United States, only a few CEOs can cheer up employees as soon as they appear in front of them like Knight. His legendary charm lies in his smallest gesture, which can also remind people of the whole glorious history of Nike.

Sportsmanship and business spirit have created Nike and tempered the cleverness and competence of the knight. Nike was just a nobody when the Cavaliers started, but he beat Adidas and made his own brand. The secret of his success is: first, he loves sports, and second, he breaks the rules in business behavior. He still wears folding oakley sunglasses, and he is not afraid to make jokes about how difficult it is to enter the elegant hall. He is an excitable and calm person. His employees are willing to create Nike myth with him, nothing else. Nevertheless, Knight is a capable person above all. He clearly knows that in the past years, when they made marathon unremitting efforts to win the competition, Nike hit a wall. After six years of the most difficult development, the company has become the most powerful force in sports. Now, because the annual sales have remained at nearly $4 billion, Knight is trying to get rid of this stagnant situation.

(C) further reform and innovation, the implementation of new marketing strategies

In order to gain a foothold in the saturated American market, Nike updated its "appearance" technology and introduced a series of new running shoes, sports shoes and other training shoes. He will also strive to expand Van Dyke's $200 million sporting goods department. Travel shoes are the only popular products in the footwear industry. Outdoor sporting goods department will compete with powerful peers such as Ting Bolan Company in this field. Its output increased by 1 times, and its profit also increased by 1 times. Knight is confident to 1996 and become the most profitable department of Nike, with sales reaching 500 million dollars.

At the same time, Nike also changed its sales methods. The outdoor products department has focused on yuppies and a new generation of unknown customers, but it is doubtful whether Nike can make them interested in Nike shoes through athletes' awareness and TV advertisements. In order to attract them and counter the public's cynicism about Nike, Nike launched the largest publicity campaign in history. 1in the spring of 994, Nike adjusted its advertising format. Retired basketball star Michael? Jordan appeared in the Chicago White Sox uniform at the Adult Baseball Spring Return League, and Nike took this opportunity to turn it into a tourism product display, which made pure baseball fans very angry.

While planning corporate image, there is another important thing: inventory control system, but enterprises often ignore this point. This system, called "futures", is the key to Nike's continued profitability. Nike requires retailers to book 80% of their total purchases 6-8 months in advance. Only in this way can Nike guarantee the delivery time and give a discount of 10%. In this way, Nike has enough time to arrange production according to the order, because it knows the order like the back of its hand. This avoids excessive inventory, and at the same time ensures that it can obtain ideal ex-factory price from its branches in Asia. Retailers hate this system, because if their estimation of the market is wrong for a while, they will be trapped by these shoes. But Nike's market attracts them to try their luck. Although Nike's competitors are doing the same thing, when Nike started to deliver the goods according to the deal already reached, it was already one step ahead of its competitors. Carmody of Reebok said: "Nike has a strong logistics system, which is much better than ours."

(D) Cross-cultural issues in marketing

Cross-cultural problems are problems that every multinational company will encounter in its management. Adidas in Germany is the biggest competitor of Nike and Reebok in Europe. Europeans instinctively prefer everything produced in continental Europe. Adidas is taking this opportunity to launch a powerful offensive against Nike. In addition, Nike sports shoes are expensive, 80-200 dollars per pair, which makes it difficult for some Europeans to accept. In view of this, Nike deliberately hyped to cater to the psychological characteristics of Europeans. For example, French youth like to show off, and Americans put price tags on their shoes to satisfy their desire for identity. In the Netherlands, people over the age of 25 like to wear white sports shoes, while people under the age of 25 like colorful sports shoes, so Nike treats them differently.

The differences between European and American cultural traditions also make some Europeans hate American goods. Li Luo, a fashion design college in Paris, hates wearing sneakers. She said, "It's just depravity. Not shining shoes is one of them, and the worst thing is to wear sneakers. " Another Italian called the woman who wears sneakers to work "ugly", but at the same time, like American movies, Disneyland has a big market for American culture in Europe, and Nike is also using the American image to shape the "sneaker family" in Europe. Knight said that the international market is Nike's strategic focus. We are all strongly aware that in a few years, the company's business abroad will be much larger than that at home. The problem is that even though foreign sales account for 65,438+0/3 of Nike's total sales at present, the development of these businesses is only achieved by simply imitating American machines by branches. The company must explore the market of football and other international sports. Knight is worried that Nike shoes are losing their original authentic and first-class image overseas. All this is attributed to the neglect of marketing strategy and loose sales organization. Foreign retailers are also complaining. Nike always uses high pressure to force them to order Nike shoes early, but only American retailers are used to this way.

In order to change this situation, Nike bought out the global distribution business in order to gain more control. Knight called on his subordinates to focus on the super-important markets of Germany, Mexico and Japan. There, Nike will convince retailers that ordering in advance is not a painful thing, the focus of advertising will be on the sports world, and Nike will also launch travel shoes to meet special market requirements. For example, badminton shoes sold in Asia and handball shoes sold in New Scandinavia. The real challenge is to find a group of competent managers and instill Nike's business style in them. But this process is full of hardships. In America, Knight thinks that the managers of this company can do well because he knows that they understand the meaning of Nike brand. That is: sports, performance, free and easy sportsmanship. This is the rich connotation of Nike's collective culture elaborated by the legendary president. Now, Knight really wants to find a group of trustworthy managers abroad, who will manage their domestic market in a pioneering way while maintaining Nike's reputation.

But the question is, can Nike culture really be translated? While exporting Nike shoes, Knight never forgets to export his own Nike culture. The reason is simple: in Oregon, there are compelling news about sports competitions and performances around Nike's compound. These reports encourage people to buy those sports shoes. Although 70% of these sports shoes, including Nike shoes, have never appeared in the gym, a sports shoes marketing expert believes that "consumers always have great interest in sports, and this interest is sustainable. This standard is very important. " In order to strengthen international marketing power, Nike is buying out distribution rights around the world so that the company can exercise more control. On the one hand, Nike hopes that good business will emerge from foreign markets; On the other hand, in order to maintain Nike's brand, we should implement the strategy formulated according to the suggestions. Nike's experience in Japan is the best example, which proves that this process is very difficult. A year ago, Knight knew that the sales business of Nike Japan branch was very big, but because he didn't combine sports and performances with the company's brand image, Nike bought the company and changed its face. Knight chose Yong Yuan to lead the work. Yuan Qiu has made great contributions to the expansion of KFC in Japan.

Due to the different cultural backgrounds and national habits of different countries, companies should attach great importance to smokers like Yuan Qiu when formulating marketing strategies and tactics, and often understand sports as a very soft pastime, such as golf. Yuan Qiu was sent to Beaverton for a four-month education on Nike culture and business methods. He threw away his cigarette and began to run. In February 65438, he returned to Nike Japan Company in Tokyo, and he issued an order prohibiting smoking in the company. For this smoky country, this ban is undoubtedly a major event. At the same time, he also forced Nike employees in Japan to participate in long-distance running training to meet the 1994 Hawaii Marathon. After the contact between Nike's head office and its branches was strengthened, Nike got its first "bonus", that is, the appearance of a special lightweight running shoe specially designed for Asian feet. But for many important aspects, especially the Nike brand itself, Yuan Qiu still can't fully understand it. Knight said that before going to Tokyo, Yuan Qiu wanted to translate "Let's do it" into accurate Japanese and submit it to Nike managers. Nike people are afraid of this. Knight recalled: "We said,' No', don't translate. We never want to hide one thing-our brand is an American brand. " Can Nike, which emphasizes cultural motivation, beat international competition? Nike, which has a huge family business, is now facing greater challenges than its initial stage and legendary entrepreneur Knight.

Due to the different cultural backgrounds and national habits of different countries, companies should attach great importance to smokers like Yuan Qiu when formulating marketing strategies and tactics, and often understand sports as a very soft pastime, such as golf. Yuan Qiu was sent to Beaverton for a four-month education on Nike culture and business methods. He threw away his cigarette and began to run. In February 65438, he returned to Nike Japan Company in Tokyo, and he issued an order prohibiting smoking in the company. For this smoky country, this ban is undoubtedly a major event. At the same time, he also forced Nike employees in Japan to participate in long-distance running training to meet the 1994 Hawaii Marathon. After the contact between Nike's head office and its branches was strengthened, Nike got its first "bonus", that is, the appearance of a special lightweight running shoe specially designed for Asian feet. But for many important aspects, especially the Nike brand itself, Yuan Qiu still can't fully understand it. Knight said that before going to Tokyo, Yuan Qiu wanted to translate "Let's do it" into accurate Japanese and submit it to Nike managers. Nike people are afraid of this. Knight recalled: "We said,' No', don't translate. We never want to hide one thing-our brand is an American brand. " Can Nike, which emphasizes cultural motivation, beat international competition? Nike, which has a huge family business, is now facing greater challenges than its initial stage and legendary entrepreneur Knight.

impression

(1) Since 1986, Nike's stock return has increased by an average of 47% every year. During the period of 1986- 1996, Fortune magazine ranked 10 among the companies in the United States. What is the secret? If we deeply study the company's philosophy, we will find that daring to take risks, breaking the rules and being unconventional are the important reasons for the company to create miracles. Gary, a senior researcher at Fortune magazine? Hamel said that the driving force of instrumental music innovation comes from the innovation of ideas and business concepts, that is, the ability to change the core of competition in existing industries and the ability to create new industries. This will become the next fundamental competitive advantage of global enterprises. In an increasingly nonlinear world, only nonlinear strategies can create huge new wealth. Not every enterprise can adjust this strategic concept. It will cause pain to the enterprise, and it will be impossible to cross this step without changing the corporate culture first. More and more companies are proving this and will continue to prove it.

(2) Constant reform and innovation and the implementation of new marketing strategies are the magic weapon for Nike to win, which is true for all industries and enterprises. In the past ten years, although some big companies have created huge wealth, they are not in the same breath as Nike, which constantly innovates in corporate culture and corporate image. While conservative companies in the department store industry focus on improving the supply chain and making a lot of insignificant expansion of the production line, innovative companies are creating brand-new product categories and retail concepts. During the period from April 1995 to April 1996, the total capital of Internet-related companies increased from almost zero to $654,380 billion in the past two years.

(3) To build a corporate culture, we must attach importance to and develop our own personality. We must fully develop our distinctive personality characteristics and establish innovations that are good at grasping various new opportunities in order to implement cultural concepts.