Anti-corporate activist group aims to 'un-cool' Nike

katu.com (ABC) ^ | 09/17/2003 | Associated Press

[TenaciousZ]

PORTLAND, Ore. -- A Vancouver, B.C.-based anti-corporate activist group is taking on sneaker giant Nike, with plans to market $60 pairs of plain canvas shoes that are a long way from Nike's signature showy athletic footwear.

Adbusters Media Foundation says it hopes to "transform capitalism" with its $1 million campaign, with funding from investors and sales of its magazine.

The group plans to take out a full page ad in The New York Times within the next two months to promote its blackSpot sneaker campaign, designed to "show that we have the power to un-cool megabrands," said Kalle Lasn, the organization's founder.

Proceeds from blackSpot shoe sales will be used to expand the campaign, which Lasn said could later target companies including McDonald's, ExxonMobil and Wal-Mart.

The $1 million campaign also includes plastering Portland-area billboards with black spots during the next six to nine months, Lasn said.

Nike officials were unimpressed with the planned assault.

"It's a testament to the strength of the Nike brand that Adbusters decided to specifically target Nike to leverage its own agenda," said Caitlin Morris, a Nike spokeswoman. "There's some skepticism as to whether or not using anti-Nike as a marketing campaign will be enough to sustain it in the marketplace."

For the past decade, activists ranging from labor advocates to environmentalists have criticized Nike's business practices, which involve hiring factories in developing Asian nations to manufacture most of its sneakers.

After receiving orders for 5,000 pairs of its shoes, Adbusters plans to contract with a unionized factory in South Korea -- most Asian shoe factories are nonunion -- to stitch together the blackSpot sneakers.

So far, pre-orders for about 1,000 pairs have come in, Lasn said, but he expects a "sudden rush" after the ad in The New York Times runs.

Lasn admits that the unorthodox blackSpot campaign would need "quite a few years" of success to eat into Nike's business. Nike controls about a third of the global market for athletic shoes, roughly the same size as rivals Adidas, Reebok and New Balance combined.

[mhking]

Some people have FAR TOO MUCH time on their hands...

Just damn.

If you want on the new list, FReepmail me. This IS a high-volume PING list...

[<1/1,000,000th%]

$60 a pair for $12 shoes???

I think they've probably got about all the orders they're going to get.

[TheBigB]

Down with capitalism! Send us money!!

[MWS]

What a lousy idea. I don't say this often, but it will never work.

What a waste of money. They could be using those funds to actually help someone...

(as if helping people really were their goal)

[sirshackleton]

These folks are more than likely the same who tout all the "will of the people" slogans, yet are attempting to quash the will of the people by artifically making things "uncool".

[meyer]

Down with capitalism! Send us money!!

Interestingly, that about sums it up for most of these groups.

[Mr. Mojo]

with plans to market $60 pairs of plain canvas shoes that are a long way from Nike's signature showy athletic footwear.

Already been done, and for a lot less that $60/pr. They're called Converse (canvas) All-Stars.

[Murtyo]

Hey, It's a free country, I wouldn't get too exercised about this.

[DTwistedSisterS]

Why South Korea? How come it isn't in America? Oh, wait, these people HATE America, thats right,.... sorry:)

[rattrap]

how is charging 60 bucks for a pair of cheap canvas shoes "fighting capitalism"?

are they going to bust their hugely expensive full page ads in the nyt

wtf?!?!?!?! i mean wtff????

is this a snl sketch? some sort of free-market vs. liberals joke?

it truely boggles the mind...

[weegee]

This will never work. The famous black Converse sneakers are now made by Nike.

With the "return of rock" this classic will make much moola for Nike.

[weegee]

Someone should tell Adbusters that a reduction in Nike sales will not raise Nike salaries.

Those kids work there because the families need the money.

Why don't these anti-capitalists fight these foreign governments to set an $8/hour minimum wage? Why take on corporations?

[weegee]

Nike owns Converse now.

[weegee]

America may be a free country but these are outside agitators. If you'll notice, they are from Canada.

If they had their way, you wouldn't be able to buy those Nike shoes (they'd be on the verboten list for industrial crimes against humanity).

[MWS]

Great point.

Part of the problem with anti-capitalists (at least from my current experiences in college, both with students and teachers) is that they really do consider government to be their friend. My Human Resources Management teacher often takes this view. He always speaks diplomatically (and thus, in the eyes of the average college student sitting in his class, his views have merit) about it being government that improves the lot of the common worker. To be fair, he has always been nice to me when I have disagreed with him in class.

Still, it saddens me to see those around me with less discerning minds having their brains filled with this rot. People like this never seem to understand that government is filled with just as many greedy and powerhungry people as "The Big Corporations".

[E Rocc]

A bunch of dirty smelly unwashed hippies stuck in the depths of the '60s are attempting to make a popular product "uncool".

It's sort of like Muzak undertaking an effort to de-popularize 50Cent, or for that matter one of the fat geeks in a high school class trying to get the prom cancelled and send the money to the UN*.

-Eric

* Michael Moore actually did this.

[metesky]

PORTLAND, Ore. -- A Vancouver, B.C.-based anti-corporate activist group is taking on sneaker giant Nike, with plans to market $60 pairs of plain canvas shoes that are a long way from Nike's signature showy athletic footwear.

Adbusters Media Foundation says it hopes to "transform capitalism" with its $1 million campaign, with funding from investors and sales of its magazine.

Sounds strangely corporatist to me...

[Murtyo]

maybe you right?? but this is about the last battle I can think of fighting. mega companies like Nike will do just fine in a Leftist world, it's everyone's freedoms to think, talk, meet, hire, fire, build, demolish, travel, broadcast, live, etc that concern me mostly. I few guys in BC shouting about corporate injustice serves some good and paying people a decent wage is fine by me, in face I think it's better to buy products from Union shops than Chinese slave labor camps

[weegee]

Part of the problem with anti-capitalists (at least from my current experiences in college, both with students and teachers) is that they really do consider government to be their friend.

Many anarchist-socialist types are anti-capitalist, anti-corporation, and anti-government. They are anarchists (who believe in a socialist apparatus that they will oversee).

Look at some of the "litter"-ature on akpress.org's website.

These anti-capitalists are anti-government. Make no doubt about it.