Nike Essays (1238 words) - Nike, Inc., Phil Knight, Bill Bowerman

Nike The Nike Foundation, formerly the Nike P.L.A.Y. Foundation, is reflection of the Nike Cultures. Nike is committed to assisting youth to achieve both their personal goals as well as to contribute to the overall betterment of our society. The focus of Nike's resources will be applied to your empowerment, sports, after-school programs, and community and environmental learning to develop skills, build confidence, and to apply critical thinking to solutions to individuals, community and global concerns. Corporate Responsibility Nike's mission for corporate responsibility is to lead in corporate citizenship through programs that reflect caring for the world family of Nike, our teammates, our consumers, and those who provide services to Nike. Nike has more that 500 contract factories around the world in about 45 countries. In May 1998, Nike set out six new corporate responsibility goals for these factories. Rather than address the goals and progress across all 500 factories. Yae Kwang Vina, a Korean owned and operated footwear manufacturer in Vietnam. To begin, Tae Kwang Vina is referred to as VT by Nike's contract manufacturing group. VT just celebrated its fourth birthday. It has 10 production assembly lines and 10,000 people, who together produce 500,000 pairs of Nike's best running shoes each month. Since it was established in the summer of 1995, VT has been run by a Tae Kwang vice president, C.T. Park, who has worked closely with Nike on corporate responsibility implementation and has done some things on his own, like donating almost $300.000 to local community projects like housing for war widows. C.T., like hundreds of other factory directors, was consulted about the proposed steps, and then briefed on the May 1998 initiatives just before Phil Knight ********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************4 All-Americans and 19 Olympians. No other coach has had a greater impact on American track and field that Bill Bowerman. Bowerman once determined that every ounce shaved off a miles shoe was 200 fewer pounds lifted in a race. With that in mind, he began crafting special shoes for his athletes. In 1964, teamed up with former Oregon student and runner, Phil Knight, to form Blue Ribbon Sports, the forerunner of Nike. Bowerman's innovative designs and Knight's business acumen were the perfect fit and by the time BRS became Nike in 1972 sales were at $1.96 million. Environmental Responsibility Nike Inc. has been an industry leader in developing new technologies which we have given away to out competitors. In the early 1990's, it was becoming evident that governments were becoming more and more regulatory in how footwear was produced and from where it was imported. By 1992, Nike made the environment and worker health and safety a major corporate goal. Between that time and the present, Nike, in conjunction with its subcontract factories and their suppliers, developed many new technologies such as waterbase adhesives and primers for footwear, waterbase mold releases, detergents for outsole degreasing. mold cleaning and as flushing agents. Between 1995 and 1999, Nike has reduced its per pair usage of organic solvents from 340 grams/pair to slightly more that 50 grams/pair, an 83% reduction. At the same time, it developed recycling programs for adhesive and primer containers. It has reduced scrap levels of EVA and rubber through internal recycling programs and its reuse-a-shoe program. In November of 1998, Nike held an open forum in Bangkok, Thailand, for footwear manufacturers on its advances in the area of Green Technology. All of the above technologies were made available to Nike's competitors along with detailed explanations and a complete question and answer period, it also includes a tour of a Nike factory that has implemented a great many of these advances. Product Produced A long history of experimentation and innovations at Nike provides proof positive that producing top-quality athletic footwear is far from simple. The process requires an extensive cast of sports specialists working in close partnerships with athletes and coaches, conducting in-depth research in the world-class Nike Sports Research Lab, studying cutting-edge technology. In short these specialists do everything in their specific performance needs to both professional and amateur athletes. And, since Nike is dedicated to producing the highest quality product possible, not even the smallest detail is overlooked during the design, development and production of each and every Nike shoe. The only problem is...this entire process takes time and money.