Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
CHAPTER
12
Industry and Services
Field Note
Branding the Backboard
SERBIA
BULGARIA
MONTENEGRO
Skopje
MACEDONIA
Adriatic
Sea
ALBANIA
Aegean
Sea
40
°
N
GREECE
20
°
E
Figure 12.1
Skopje, Macedonia.
The Nike “swoosh” is everywhere—even on the backboard of a basket-
ball hoop in this relatively poor neighborhood of Skopje, Macedonia.
© Alexander B. Murphy.
Walking through a relatively poor neighborhood in Skopje, Macedonia, with the
midday Muslim call to prayer ringing in my ears, the last thing I expected to see
was something from my home State of Oregon (Fig. 12.1). But there it was—the
unmistakable Nike swoosh on the backboard of a basketball hoop where the local
kids play pick-up games!
As ubiquitous as the Nike brand of athletic shoes and its trademark swoosh
are on the landscape, the cultural landscape does not tell us where Nike shoes are
produced. University of Oregon track coach Bill Bowerman and one of his former
runners, Phil Knight, founded Nike in 1961. Knight designed the waffl e sole to cre-
ate more traction for runners, and Nike sold $8000 in footwear in its fi rst year.
Nike has grown to be a giant in the shoe and apparel business with sales of over
$19 billion in 2009. With headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon, a suburb of Portland,
the company is far more than an Oregon concern. Although several thousand
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