Prefontaine Built Nike

A story about how Nike leveraged star runner Steve Prefontaine in the 1970s to transform both their brand and running culture in America.

"In the 1970s, there was this guy Steve Prefontaine. He was like the Michael Phelps of his time. No one was really thinking about running until Prefontaine came along and was such a dominant athlete from the USA.

Prefontaine had all these great quotes like 'If you don't run until you feel like you're gonna die, you're not honoring your gift.' He won every college record from 500 meter up to 2,000 meter. Nike was just starting out, going from being a distributor to making their own shoes. They were fortunately in Oregon, same as Prefontaine, and got him to wear their shoes.

Before Prefontaine, if you went jogging in the 40s, 50s, or 60s, people would throw bottles at you from their cars. They'd be mad like 'What is this idiot doing?' But Prefontaine comes along and running actually becomes cool.

Back then people were wearing basic shoes like loafers or work shoes. People wanted to rebel against the shoes their dad was wearing, so they started wearing these athletic shoes as part of their daily attire. It changed the entire shoe market. Now athletic shoes are probably the best-selling shoes, and only a tiny percentage are worn for athletic activities. That all started in the 70s with Prefontaine.

Tragically, Prefontaine passed in a car accident before he could honor his Olympic glory, but before he did that, he really put Nike on the map."