Biographies
by Phil Knight
How do you start from nothing?
In 1962 Phil Knight was 24, back living with his parents in Oregon and unsure what to do with his life. He had what he called a Crazy Idea. Shoe Dog is his account of how that idea became Nike, and of the many times it nearly failed.
Hear a sample · read by Laura
At Stanford business school Knight wrote a paper asking whether Japanese running shoes could do to German brands what Japanese cameras had done to German cameras. Adidas and Puma ruled athletics then. He believed well-made, cheaper shoes from Japan could take them on.
Later in 1962 Knight flew to Japan and got a meeting with Onitsuka, the maker of Tiger running shoes. Asked what company he represented, he invented one on the spot, Blue Ribbon Sports. For years afterwards, Blue Ribbon's whole business was selling Tigers in America.
Blue Ribbon's sales kept climbing, yet it never had cash. Knight put every dollar into bigger orders, and his bankers kept telling him to slow down. He wouldn't. At the worst point his bank froze his accounts, and a Japanese trading company, Nissho Iwai, stepped in to keep him going.
Knight uses the phrase for people who give themselves completely to making, selling or designing shoes. His early team were misfits, and all of them were shoe dogs. Jeff Johnson, his first full-time employee, wrote him endless letters and dreamt up the name Nike, after the Greek goddess of victory.
A crazy idea
At 24, Knight's crazy idea was to sell good, cheap Japanese running shoes in America.
Keep going
When things went wrong, he kept pushing ahead. Quitting was the one choice he wouldn't consider.
Cash
Sales kept doubling, yet Blue Ribbon was always short of cash because growth ate it all.
The waffle iron
His old coach Bill Bowerman made soles on his wife's waffle iron, and the waffle trainer was born.
Nike
When his supplier Onitsuka tried to cut him out, Knight made his own brand and called it Nike.
A story from the book
Bill Bowerman, Knight's running coach at the University of Oregon, became his first partner in 1964. He was forever tinkering with shoes. One day he poured liquid rubber into his wife's waffle iron, hunting for better grip. The waffle sole became one of Nike's early hits.
Hot take · true or myth?
Knight's old running coach was his first business partner.
True. In 1964 Bill Bowerman, who had coached him at the University of Oregon, went into business with him. They each put in $500.
One thing to try
Knight's Crazy Idea started as a class paper, and his first real step was a plane ticket. This week, write one page on an idea you keep coming back to, saying who it's for and why it could work. Then take one small step towards it.
Knotd has the key ideas from 250+ non-fiction books, each in a few minutes, in plain words. Shoe Dog comes with a Hot Take round to make it stick.
Get the whole book on KnotdOpen in the appHow do you start from nothing? In 1962 Phil Knight was 24, back living with his parents in Oregon and unsure what to do with his life. He had what he called a Crazy Idea. Shoe Dog is his account of how that idea became Nike, and of the many times it nearly failed.
The Crazy Idea; It began as Blue Ribbon; Growing fast, always broke; What a shoe dog is.
Knight's Crazy Idea started as a class paper, and his first real step was a plane ticket. This week, write one page on an idea you keep coming back to, saying who it's for and why it could work. Then take one small step towards it.
Yes. Knotd has the key ideas from Shoe Dog in a few minutes, in plain words, plus a Hot Take round to test them. It's one of 250+ non-fiction books in the app.
