The author of this book is Phil Knight, the legendary founder and leader of Nike in the United States. He has also served as the chairman and president of Nike for many years. He was born in Oregon, USA, in 1938. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a bachelor's degree and a master's degree from Stanford Business School. His father is an ordinary publisher and his mother is a full-time housewife. Phil Knight loves long-distance running and is an athlete himself. As an undergraduate, he specialized in long-distance running at the University of Oregon and met legendary American track and field coach Bill Bowerman. Phil Knight has been closely associated with running and running shoes throughout his life. It was this love that prompted him to decide to start a business and eventually successfully established Nike.
About this book
This book is the autobiography of Mr. Phil Knight. It is the first time that he has publicly and officially disclosed to everyone the development process of Nike from scratch. , and summarized and reviewed his own entrepreneurial experience.
Core content
This book mainly tells the entrepreneurial history of Mr. Phil Knight from 1962 to 1980. This period was divided into two stages with 1972 as the dividing point: the 10 years from 1962 to 1972 were the development stage of "Blue Ribbon Sports Sales Company", the predecessor of Nike. During this period, the Philippines Earl Knight mainly represents the sales of Japanese Onitsuka Tiger sports shoes in the United States; after 1972, he created his own Nike brand and the company developed independently. The author of this book uses simple and humorous language to tell us his personal entrepreneurial experience and insights during the past 18 years, as well as the stories between him and his entrepreneurial partners.
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1. Shoe dog
The so-called shoe dog is not an animal, it actually refers to is a kind of person - in the words of the author, it refers to "a person who devotes himself wholeheartedly to making, selling, buying or designing shoes". It can also be understood as those senior sports shoe enthusiasts who regard shoes as their ultimate hobby, never leave their hands all day long, and are obsessed with shoes.
The author of this book, Phil Knight, is the first shoe dog to appear in the book. This person is a person who is obsessed with shoes. All he thinks about are shoes every day. Some people think he is a lunatic, but he never cares about other people's strange looks. On the contrary, he has been immersed in the craze for sneakers for decades and never tires of it, thinking that it is a virtue of concentration. Therefore, he uses the word "shoe dog" to express his identity and relies on it to find like-minded people.
2. Bill Bowerman
This man is the author's fellow countryman and his teacher. He serves as a professional track and field coach at the University of Oregon. He has a strict style and is taciturn. The author worked under him when he was in college. Although this person is a coach, he is very weird. His interest lies entirely in the feet of athletes. He searches for all kinds of strange materials all day long to make his own running shoes.
When the author decided to start a business, he immediately thought of this eccentric teacher and invited him to join the partnership. In the end, each person only came up with 500 US dollars, and the total was 1,000 US dollars - this is the beginning of Nike's legend. Then this coach is the author's partner.
Bill Bowerman invented the "waffle running shoe" in 1971, which became one of the Nike logo products after it was launched. Because these shoes are so comfortable and beautiful, people not only wear them to run in the sports field, but also wear them to work, school, and shopping—a pair of simple sneakers set off a social trend for the first time.
3. Jeff Johnson
This man is a classmate whom the author met when he was studying for a master's degree at Stanford University, and he is also a team member of the school's track and field team. This man is also an out-and-out shoe dog. After graduation, he couldn't give up his obsession with sports shoes and helped Adidas sell shoes in his spare time. After the author heard about it, he invited him to help him develop the market full-time. Therefore, this Jeff Johnson became the company's third oldest person, in charge of sales and marketing.
Although this person appears to be in sales, he is actually more obsessed with the shoes themselves. Not only that, this man also has a quirk. He insists on doing one thing every day - writing letters to his boss. What he writes is the record of his conversations with customers.
In fact, this person is not looking for a sense of existence. He really likes and loves shoes from the bottom of his heart, which is why he has persisted for so long.
4. Love
The author believes that the reason why he was able to devote himself to entrepreneurship and build the great company Nike was all due to following his inner hobbies. At that time, Phil Knight was actually an ordinary young man, and he was very confused and struggling. He completed his master's degree in business school at the university, and when he returned home, he had no idea what kind of job he should find. In order to relieve this anxiety and confusion, he often sneaked to the hill behind his house alone in the early morning before the sun rose, kept running through the woods, and complained to himself.
A crazy idea rescued Phil Knight from mediocrity. He believes that Japanese products were already very powerful back then. In the field of cameras, Japanese cameras have already defeated German cameras, so in the field of sports shoes, Japanese shoes will surely beat German Adidas sooner or later. Therefore, Japanese shoes should be recommended to Americans as soon as possible so that everyone can enjoy better and more comfortable sports shoes. He decided to follow his heart and use this as a breakthrough to start his entrepreneurial career.
The author did three things: The first thing was to sell the car, use up all his savings from working during the summer vacation, collect some travel expenses, and go to Japan alone in 1962. The second thing was that in Japan, he came to Kobe alone, walked into the door of Onitsuka Tiger Sports Shoes Company of Japan single-handedly, and told the other party that he wanted to sell their sports shoes in the United States. The third thing was that after negotiation, we spent $50 to wholesale 12 pairs of sports shoes from Japan. These 12 pairs of shoes wholesaled for US$50 were the starting point for his business.
5. Persistence
After the author started his business, his business progressed very poorly. This extremely unsatisfactory situation has never really changed in the 13 years since he started his business in 1962 until the outbreak of Nike's debt crisis in 1975. Every day is full of all kinds of depression, helplessness, even fear and embarrassment. Among them are the betrayal of partners, the instigation of banks, and even the lack of support and understanding from family members, etc. - the bitterness of it is difficult to describe in words.
Two short stories. The first was the 12 pairs of shoes. He happily gave the money and returned home happily, ready to have a big job. As a result, he traveled across the ocean from Japan to the United States and was on the road for more than a year. During this period, he sent several telegrams to urge the other party, but there was still no progress. He didn't know whether it was a problem with the other party's delivery or the logistics on the road. slow. During this period, the author really had no choice but to go to an accounting firm and find a job to make ends meet. But he did not give up on his original decision. A year later, when the goods arrived, he immediately started promoting and selling them, and decided to start a company in partnership with Bill Bowerman.
The second story is that in the days that followed, Onitsuka Tiger Company of Japan had been subtly and overtly treating Phil Knight. On the surface, it promised to give him exclusive agency rights, but in fact, it secretly contacted other companies in the United States behind the scenes. The company also deliberately made difficulties and delays in supplying goods. In the 6th year of starting his business, Phil Knight could hardly make any money and could hardly continue doing it. He had no choice but to go to the university and find a job as a teaching assistant. He used his salary as a teacher to pay employees. salary.
In 1971, by chance, he peeked into the folder of a Japanese sales manager, and that was when he really got the evidence to fight back. After all the truth came to light, Phil Knight did not give up. Instead, he decided to leave the Japanese company behind, take a group of shoe dog brothers, fly out and go it alone, and established Nike. It was also in that year, 1971, that the famous Nike trademark: a flying hook was officially born. The word NIKE means "victory".
6. Passion
When Nike was founded, it made the word passion an integral part of its corporate culture. So the culture advocated by Nike actually comes from an athlete culture in the sports arena. The author believes that on the field, every athlete must have full passion. Only in this way can he stay active and leave his opponents behind. Once the passion disappears, no matter how good the athlete is, he will not be able to achieve any results.
Introduce two typical signs.
One is the Nike logo, and the other is a flying hook. In 1971, when Phil Knight decided to leave the Japanese company and go it alone, these shoe dogs got together to think about what kind of logo to design that could perfectly interpret a brand. An athlete's passion. They thought about it a lot, and finally this hook was born. In the words of the author, its meaning is: "Like a track and field athlete, running quickly past you with a whoosh." In addition, there is a famous slogan of Nike: just do it - just don’t think so much, just do it. Such a passionate slogan once became a household name and was deeply loved by everyone - it even became the motto of many young Americans. Like the famous hook, it has long gone beyond the scope of advertising and has become a kind of American culture. Phenomenon.
In terms of the company's internal management, Phil Knight has also implemented this passion culture very thoroughly. For example, the most typical one is called a "villain meeting" - the so-called "villain meeting" is a work party invented by Phil Knight to promote communication between entrepreneurial partners. Every once in a while, he would summon this group of shoe-dog brothers and fly in from all over the United States. They would all go to a resort, book a hotel room, and laugh and curse as much as they wanted—anything could be said, and anyone could do it. scold. This seemingly ridiculous gathering is actually to maintain the passion and vitality between him and his partners - and this kind of thing is the most precious wealth of a startup company.
7. Innovation
During the 18 years of entrepreneurship, the author has encountered various challenges from Japanese companies, entrepreneurial partners and banks. In fact, these problems are only part of his entrepreneurial challenges. More difficulties came from the pressure from other brands at that time. At that time, in 1971, when the author started to establish Nike, the entire American sports shoe market was already a red ocean. Nike, which was unknown at the time, was able to carve out a way out of this fierce competition and maintain its position until now, relying on innovation.
The most typical example, and the classic case that made Nike famous, is its air-cushion shoes. In 1977, five years after Nike was founded, Phil Knight met a very eccentric man named Frank Rudy. Rudy recommended air-cushion shoe technology to Phil Knight, which was readily adopted by Nike. With the continuous polishing and research and development of a group of shoe dogs, after 9 months, this landmark product in Nike's history was finally successfully launched.
Nike’s air-cushioned shoes brought huge profits and honors to the company. By 1979, two years after the author met this strange aerospace engineer, Nike had already entered the U.S. market. Invincible, it successfully overtook Adidas and created a business miracle. So Nike's air-cushion shoe technology has not stopped updating itself since then. To this day, air-cushion shoes are still the largest technical branch in the Nike sports shoe family.
Golden sentences:
1. Cowards never set off, weak people die on the way, only we are left to move forward and never stop.
2. People always respect those who break the rules.
3. I hope that my life will be more meaningful, that I can have goals, be creative, and have a pivotal position. Most importantly, I want to be different - you don't always win in life, and I just don't want to lose.
4. Dare to take risks and don’t let your talents be buried in mediocrity.
5. Don’t care what others say that your idea is crazy, just keep moving forward. Don’t stop, don’t even think about stopping until you reach your goal. Don’t focus too much on where the “goal” is, and don’t stop no matter what you face.
Written by: Li Ruirui
Narrated by: Li Ruirui
Mind map: Moses