Nike: Managing Ethical Missteps

Zeng, Jin (Ada) MGT 502

Summary # Case 9 Apr 7, 2014

NIKE: Managing Ethical Missteps

---Sweatshops to Leadership in Employment Practices

Nike’s History:

Nike was founded by Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman in 1964. The idea was created by Knight during his MBA program. At that time, Knight wrote a paper about Onitsuka Tiger, which is a Japanese shoe company and was imported into the U.S. market. After Knight and Bill operated their company, they started to cooperate with Onitsuka Tiger until 1971, and then they renamed their company into Nike in 1978. For now, Nike has become the largest seller of athletic goods around the world and has about 19,000 retail accounts in the U.S. One of the reasons that Nike becomes popular around the world is from celebrity athlete sponsors, in order to let its products apparel more to customers.

The name of Nike is from a goddess who personified victory in Greek mythology, also known as the Winged Goddess of Victory. Nike’s products include apparel, shoes, sports equipment, and so on. The trademark of Nike is the symbol of the wing of the Goddess of Victory, also means speed.

Criticisms of Nike’s Manufacturing Practices and Environmental Problems:

Nowadays, in order to reduce cut costs, many companies move their production line to low labor cost nations, including Nike. The majority of Nike’s products are produced in Vietnam, Indonesia, and China. The working condition in these areas has been debating for a long time. Sweatshop labor is not merely an issue for Nike. It can be chased back to 1990s of criticism from labor rights activists. It was about the health and safety condition, low wages, and indiscriminate hiring and firing practices. In 1996, Life...