Tiger Backs Nike's Social Commentary/Ads

[jbishop15]

5 minutes ago, parman said:

Last I  heard was that he's worth approx. 700 million. They estimate he will be the 1st billionaire golfer. Plus he is still being payed by his sponsors. I seriously doubt it's about money. Politics doesn't belong on a golf forum. 

I agree that it's not about the money, or, at least, not about NIKE's money.

There has been a shift in certain social ideas (things like gay marriage and the like) that have become more popular and present amongst the mainstream public. Tiger and NIKE could see it as a way of keeping their brand in line with the rest of their competition.

It's worth mentioning that gigantic companies like Coca-Cola have expressed support for similar ideas. 

 

[krupa]

 

8 minutes ago, iacas said:

As tight a line as I'm asking people to walk here, make sure the discussion involves Tiger and not general politics.

So… more GOATs and less "sheep."

To avoid the line, I'm going to drop the discussion I started.

As for Mr. GOAT, I hope he follows up this tweet with some personal appearances or something... At the same time, it's just a shoe ad, will Nike follow-up with anything else?  What else can they do?  That's what really gets me.  Ads are great for broadcasting a "we care" message but do they actually make a difference?

 

Edited February 13, 2017 by krupa

[skydog]

13 minutes ago, iacas said:

So… more GOATs and less "sheep."

Jack is in the ad too??

::Couldn't help myself::

[iacas]

10 minutes ago, krupa said:

Ads are great for broadcasting a "we care" message but do they actually make a difference?

Probably not. Just makes people feel good about paying too much for shoes.

[krupa]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

Probably not. Just makes people feel good about paying too much for shoes.

Pretty much what I was thinking.  The cynic in me says that this ad campaign is just trying to avoid a #BoycottNike hashtag.

[Lihu]

4 minutes ago, iacas said:

Probably not. Just makes people feel good about paying too much for shoes.

It was a very well produced ad and I like that Tiger endorsed it, but it's likely not as influential as the producers had hoped?

I just bought my son $190 Nike Golf shoes***, and I have to say this ad really didn't do all that much for me personally. . .

 

Just now, krupa said:

Pretty much what I was thinking.  The cynic in me says that this ad campaign is just trying to avoid a #BoycottNike hashtag.

Kind of what I think too. Realistically, IDK know how may companies can avoid that? They all make a lot of money, and likely have some executive that voted for Trump.

On the flip side, how many companies can people boycott and still live a relatively normal life?

 

 

***My daughter went with Adidas.

[Groucho Valentine]

Time to boycott Nike! Im tired of these passive aggressive attacks on trump. Not fair! Sad! 

[Kalnoky]

FWIW, Nike has been known to support conservative ballot measures and candidates here in its home state of Oregon.

In recent weeks I have rec'd several politically tinged emails from different companies essentially saying the same thing as these Tiger Woods ads. 

Edited February 13, 2017 by Kalnoky

[Chilli Dipper]

41 minutes ago, Lihu said:

Kind of what I think too. Realistically, IDK know how may companies can avoid that? They all make a lot of money, and likely have some executive that voted for Trump.

On the flip side, how many companies can people boycott and still live a relatively normal life?

The best path forward for companies like Nike is to establish their corporate values through campaigns like this one. They don't want to be in a position like New Balance was in shortly after the election, where the CEO made a laudatory statement toward Trump in the context of TPP, and suffered a bout of bad press for weeks afterward. Civil rights, equal rights, and LGBT rights are broadly popular with the general public, and it's good for Nike to align itself with those sentiments; they will likely need that goodwill later on, because it cannot avoid politics altogether for the next four years.

(As an aside: my politics are liberal, but I don't see the benefit to the impulse to #boycott every corporation whose executives agree to sit down with the President. It's plausible that the only voices of dissent whose opinions Trump values enough to listen to will come from business leaders, and those leaders should not be discouraged from such an opportunity.)

Also, with Tiger, we're talking about a mixed-race Buddhist with an enormous public profile at a time where lots of people are concerned about the influence of people espousing white Christian nationalist ideology in domestic policy. If he has any activist intentions, now is a good time to get started.

[Lihu]

19 minutes ago, Chilli Dipper said:

Also, with Tiger, we're talking about a mixed-race Buddhist with an enormous public profile at a time where lots of people are concerned about the influence of people espousing white Christian nationalist ideology in domestic policy. If he has any activist intentions, now is a good time to get started.

That's one reason I see Tiger as a good representative of more than just the one type of person that is represented by the ad campaign. The ad campaign should be more broad and cover more ground.

The ad is too tightly targeted.

The perfect ad would have been more about anybody considered an "underdog" being able to achieve big or simply good things later in life. Instead, it was about good or great athletes, who can do anything because they're star athletes.

What about everyone else?

[rehmwa]

I didn't see this ad to be 'political' in any way.  I did see it to be 'social' in intent, though very lopsided in execution.  (those that infer that 'equality' has a bias to any specific political basis doesn't really understand the political philosophies as defined by their members - disregard the strawmen)

Tiger is a great example of success from a 'melting pot' background - if that isn't the perfect example for equality of opportunity, I don't know what is.

[saevel25]

 

3 hours ago, krupa said:

Pretty much what I was thinking.  The cynic in me says that this ad campaign is just trying to avoid a #BoycottNike hashtag.

I don't think Nike cares. It's a nice feel good message. A lot of companies do them. No big deal. 

There is a boycott everything movement. Nike might be the starter of it all back when people wanted to boycott them for their use of cheap labor. 

 

[JonMA1]

2 hours ago, rehmwa said:

Tiger is a great example of success from a 'melting pot' background - if that isn't the perfect example for equality of opportunity, I don't know what is.

Agreed.

I also get the impression Tiger might have been successful had he gone into finance, medicine, law....

I think the same could be said for many athletes who reach a high level. It takes a great deal of determination to succeed - whether through sports or any other industry/profession. If that determination can be focused in the right direction, opportunity exists. It may be harder for some, but it's there.

 

[saevel25]

10 minutes ago, JonMA1 said:

Agreed.

I also get the impression Tiger might have been successful had he gone into finance, medicine, law....

Tiger still might become very successful in business ventures has his career winds down. 

11 minutes ago, JonMA1 said:

I think the same could be said for many athletes who reach a high level. 

I disagree. There many athletes who are not financially smart, or book smart. I don't think you can correlate athletes = business successful. Look at the NFL, a lot of players burn through that money they get. 

 

[iacas]

39 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

I disagree. There many athletes who are not financially smart, or book smart. I don't think you can correlate athletes = business successful. Look at the NFL, a lot of players burn through that money they get. 

Right. That's why the smartest of them realize it's not their forté, and hire a business manager to do most of that stuff.

[GolfLug]

Equality for ALL? I saw only one sport dominant race in the ad with a token gay person. Seems like Tiger is setting up TGR to be Nike's mini-me, honestly no idea what that will eventually mean. He likes the Nike model. 

Maybe this is a feel good ad but Nike is still mostly business here, IMO, since the ad seems to be targeting their main customer demographic.

[parman]

The way I read the OP is social, not political. I just think the OP title is a little misleading. 

[Lihu]

1 hour ago, GolfLug said:

Equality for ALL? I saw only one sport dominant race in the ad with a token gay person. Seems like Tiger is setting up TGR to be Nike's mini-me, honestly no idea what that will eventually mean. He likes the Nike model. 

Maybe this is a feel good ad but Nike is still mostly business here, IMO, since the ad seems to be targeting their main customer demographic.