There’s nothing that Donald Trump would have liked more than to see Nike’s sales take a hit when his misguided followers decided to “boycott” the sports apparel and equipment manufacturer over their decision to name Colin Kaepernick the face of their 30th anniversary “Just Do It” campaign.
Like any number of boycotts before it, Trump supporters seemed not to understand that simply destroying items they’d already paid for doesn’t actually do any damage to the company — it’s like setting their own money on fire. And speaking of setting things on fire, that seemed to be the preferred method of destruction, with videos of Republicans setting their sneakers ablaze all over social media.
But Trump would get no satisfaction from the “boycott” after Nike doubled and tripled down on their wager on Kaepernick, putting a giant billboard on top of their flagship store in San Francisco, then buying ad time on the opening night game for this new NFL season.
At the beginning of the 2018Â season, his humiliation was nearly complete: Nike posted their online sales figures since the Kaepernick announcement and it was anything but disappointing.
If it was Nike’s dream to boost their sales by a third in just a week, well, that’s not such a crazy dream, is it?
According to MarketWatch, that’s just what happened. After an initial small drop, Nike’s sales came booming back in a big way, posting a 31 percent gain from the Sunday on Labor Day weekend through the Tuesday following — which is 14 percent higher than the same period last year. Some increase is expected at the outset of football season since jerseys are such a huge commodity, but a massive increase like this can only mean one thing: People like what they see.
And what did they see that opening night before the big Falcons-Eagles game?
A work of art:
But Nike wasn’t quite done humiliating the race-baiter in chief.
According to this incredible report from CBS, the company added a staggering $6 billion to Nike’s market value in just the weeks after the ad came out, with a wave of investors who saw the writing on the wall and bought stock. In fact, Nike stock has gained 36 percent this year according to MoneyWatch, and that made it the top performer on the entire Dow index of 30 blue-chip stocks.
Now Nike has released their year-end earnings, not just exceeding analysts’ expectations, but seeing growth in the double digits for footwear and apparel, their two largest divisions, around the globe.
So not only did Nike make a hero out of a man Trump must feel is a mortal enemy, but they made bigger gains than any other blue-chip stock in the only metric the President even recognizes as a legitimate sign of the economy.
That has GOT to hurt.
Featured image via screen capture
