For almost 4 a long time, Nike has been telling individuals to “Simply Do It.” At present, the model is reintroducing its iconic tagline, flipping it right into a query: “Why Do It?”
The reply to that query is a serious new marketing campaign issuing the “Simply Do It” rallying cry to the subsequent technology. Amid the model’s turnaround, Nike needs to ask younger athletes to write down the subsequent chapter of its legacy.
The “Why Do It?” marketing campaign, created by Wieden+Kennedy Portland, kicks off Sept. 4 to coincide with the beginning of many sports activities seasons. The advert options athletes from numerous sports activities spanning basketball, soccer, baseball, soccer, tennis, diving, and racing.
The various, world group of athletes consists of Caitlin Clark, Carlos Alcaraz, Saquon Barkley, LeBron James, Rayssa Leal, and Qinwen Zheng. Every is wrestling with their very own goal and should reply, “Why Do It?”
Tyler, the Creator narrates the spot.
Nike’s contemporary tackle “Simply Do It” reframes greatness as a alternative, moderately than a given final result. It speaks to a younger technology that’s “hesitant to get on the market due to this worry of perfectionism,” Nicole Graham, Nike’s govt vp and chief advertising officer, instructed ADWEEK.
“As we speak with younger athletes, it’s simply an absolute stress cooker of comparability, making an attempt to be excellent, worry of failing, and worry of even making an attempt in lots of instances,” she stated.
The movie captures athletes not within the glory of profitable, however in the intervening time they select to take a danger: kicking a ball, taking a swing, diving off a board.
“The entire concept of ‘Why Do It?’ is about taking that first step and truly doing it,” Graham stated. “We wished to provide voice to these doubts, however very clearly give a solution: do it and look what occurs.”
A line that strikes with tradition
Since Nike and Wieden+Kennedy launched “Simply Do It” in 1988, it has grow to be one of the crucial well-known model slogans of all time.
“These are three very treasured phrases to us,” Graham stated. “These phrases have taken on completely different meanings primarily based on what’s happening in tradition.”
The primary advert to make use of the tagline confirmed 80-year-old runner Walt Stack jogging throughout the Golden Gate Bridge, demonstrating that sports activities are for everybody.
1995’s “If You Let Me Play” prolonged that message to ladies and younger girls by displaying how sports activities may change their lives.
In 2018, the thirtieth anniversary of “Simply Do It,” Nike took a daring stance by that includes former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who had stirred controversy along with his protests of racial injustice, in its “Dream Loopy” advert.
“Simply Do It” got here to be embodied by legendary athletes together with Michael Jordan, Serena Williams, Tiger Woods, and Kobe Bryant, who demonstrated that while you present up, something is feasible.
Returning to relevance
But lately, Nike has confronted sluggish gross sales and declining model worth, whereas struggling to compete with legacy rivals corresponding to Adidas and upstart manufacturers like On and Hoka that attraction to Gen Z.
“We weren’t as sharp and clear on our values as an organization,” Graham stated.
During the last 18 months, Nike has launched into a advertising transformation to return its model to relevance.
In November 2023, the corporate introduced again Graham, who’d beforehand been at Nike for 17 years earlier than beginning her personal company, as CMO.
In October 2024, Elliott Hill, one other longtime Nike veteran, returned as CEO, changing John Donahoe.
Earlier this 12 months, after Nike’s full 2025 fiscal 12 months income fell 10% year-over-year to $46.3 billion, Hill introduced the corporate would shift its focus from life-style advertising to efficiency put on by a brand new technique referred to as “Sport Offense,” which works in tandem with its “Win Now” turnaround plan.
As a part of that turnaround, Nike reorganized its enterprise to be segmented by sports activities, moderately than the lads’s, girls’s, and kids’s classes. Its latest advertising has drilled down on particular sports activities communities, large reside sports activities moments such because the Olympics and Tremendous Bowl, and athlete-focused storytelling.
For instance, Nike launched the “Profitable Isn’t Snug” marketing campaign final 12 months to champion runners. In February, it returned to the Tremendous Bowl after 27 years with “So Win,” a celebration of feminine athletes.
The sports-focused technique is driving “actual momentum” for the enterprise, Graham stated.
“What we have now tried to do as a model is reaffirm we’re in love with profitable, however profitable is relative to no matter you’re making an attempt to do in your life. There’s no straight linear path, and there’s some ways to get there,” Graham stated. “This newest marketing campaign [shows] how profitable and greatness and potential is all a couple of alternative.”
