Full Market Branding Analysis of Nike in APA

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Part I.
Research the selected brand using both its Web site and articles in the library's full-text databases
*What does the brand mean in today's market?
*How has it evolved over time?
*What is the target market(s) for the brand? Has that changed from the past?
*How is the competition positioned?

Company examined: Nike Inc.

For Nike, the journey from their humble beginning to now has been nothing short of magnificent in the marketing and branding world. In today's ever growing sports consumer market, Nike stands head and shoulders above all others and is considered the premiere name brand in sports and athletic equipment and apparel. From its famous athletes and sports teams that it sponsors and promotes to its infamous "Swoosh" logo that's known around the world, Nike continues to raise the bar in sports equipment excellence and brand recognition (Hollister, 2008).

This was not always the case though. Nike's evolvement over the past 4 decades is a truly remarkable story. Nike was formed in 1964 by Oregon track star Philip Knight and his coach at that time, Bill Bowerman. The original name of the company when formed was "Blue Ribbon Sports" (BRS) and it was solely a shoe distributor for the Japanese company, "Asics footwear", catering primarily to the track and field crowds (Hollister, 2008).

The relationship between BRS and Asics began to crumble in the early 70's and in June of 1971; BRS founders Knight and Bowerman launched their own line of shoes, the first of which was a soccer shoe they named, Nike. They took the Nike name from the Greek "Nike"- for Goddess of Victory. Over the next several years, BRS changed its name to Nike Inc. and began to see rapid growth of its shoe sales. The company's first original shoe design was the "waffle" bottom design that became the state of the art athletic shoe by the end of the 70's and into the 80's (Hollister, 2008).

By the beginning of the 80's, Nike had achieved over 50% of the market share for athletic shoes and in December of 1980, they took their name brand public. Nike's promotion of its brand was primarily focused on the soccer and track shoe industry through word of mouth advertising up to this ...