In this exclusive interview with Fortune, Nike's newly appointed CEO Elliott Hill shares his vision for the iconic sportswear brand's future. From intern to chief executive, Hill's 30+ year journey at Nike has given him unique insights into the company's DNA. He discusses his plans to refocus on Nike's core strengths, emphasizing sports and athlete partnerships while addressing recent challenges in sales and market positioning. Hill outlines strategies to balance direct-to-consumer sales with wholesale partnerships, reduce promotional pricing, and drive innovation in key categories like running and basketball. With a commitment to authenticity and a deep understanding of Nike's heritage, Hill aims to lead the company back to its roots while pushing forward into a new era of growth and innovation.
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00:00Is this a return to Nike's roots?
00:02No question. I think every company has a core of what makes them great.
00:06And I think sport is the core of what we are we are about.
00:10We're about human potential and performance.
00:13Nike's back.
00:14Since starting as an intern in apparel sales in 1988,
00:18Elliott Hill has spent his entire career climbing Nike's ranks.
00:22He has spearheaded some of the company's biggest sportswear launches
00:25and led headline grab-in marketing campaigns.
00:28So don't ask if your dreams are crazy.
00:31Ask if they're crazy enough.
00:34Now, more than 30 years later, all eyes are on him as he steps
00:38into the company's most prominent job, CEO.
00:42It almost feels surreal, like, hey, did this just happen?
00:44But Hill has taken the reins at a time when Nike is grappling
00:48with declining sales and a falling stock price.
00:51How do you think you're performing at this point?
00:53I think we can be better.
00:54As Hill kicks off his 33rd year at Nike and third month
00:58as CEO, he recounted his journey to the corner office and what's
01:01next for the sports retail giant.
01:05Nike's sprawling facilities in Beaverton, Oregon, didn't exist
01:09when Hill first started as an intern.
01:11We very much wanted it to feel like a campus.
01:13We moved here in 1990.
01:15The buildings that you can see across the way in brown were the
01:18first buildings.
01:19At the start of 1988, the company was worth just over 700 million
01:24dollars. Three decades later, it's valued at more than 100
01:27billion dollars.
01:29You are Nike's newly minted CEO.
01:32How did you get here?
01:33I took a sports marketing class and I wrote a paper around
01:37this company called Nike.
01:38I fell in love with the company and I said, you know, that's the
01:41type of company I want to work for.
01:43I can combine sport with business.
01:46And I was fortunate there was a guy named Tim Joyce who came
01:50to speak at our university.
01:51And after he finished speaking, I went up to him, said, I want to
01:54work for Nike. And I bothered him for about six months and he
01:57finally hired me. And I started at Nike June 1 of 88 as a as an
02:01intern. That internship was a springboard to a lifetime career
02:06at Nike. In his early years, Hill held various sales roles,
02:09selling shoes to mom and pop retailers and driving around in an
02:13old minivan.
02:14I was driving around in a used Dodge minivan, that's for sure.
02:19I drove 60,000 miles a year and I started out in sales.
02:23I worked my way up through the sales organization, different
02:25experiences. Hill steadily moved up the ladder, never staying in
02:29the same role for more than four years.
02:32In 2018, he was promoted to president of Consumer and Marketplace,
02:36a role he held until 2020 when he retired.
02:39But his exit didn't last long.
02:42Four years later, Nike's former CEO, John Donahoe, was out.
02:46Nike CEO John Donahoe is going to be leaving the company.
02:51During the pandemic, Donahoe's aggressive e-commerce and direct to
02:55consumer business approach helped drive Nike's share price to a
02:58historic high in November 2021.
03:01But as the pandemic wound down, market conditions changed and those
03:04strategies started to backfire.
03:06The company lost market share and strained its relationships with
03:09retail partners, all while losing sales and street cred.
03:13The board needed a replacement.
03:15Walk me through how this came to fruition, your return to Nike.
03:19I had stayed in touch with people at Nike at all levels of the
03:23organization. It was a series of phone calls.
03:26And you know what?
03:29It was a pretty quick decision for me.
03:32Nike's share price jumped by more than 6 percent just a day after it
03:35announced Hill would assume the top job.
03:38Is there a part of you that felt you had something to prove?
03:41Had a great second chapter, if you will, business career.
03:44I was doing a number of investments and projects that inspired me,
03:48motivated, kept me busy.
03:50But I have to admit, there were those moments when I would walk away
03:53from a board meeting, as an example, where your your responsibility
03:56is to steer, guide, suggest, provide thoughts, perspectives,
04:02and then you leave and you don't have the responsibility for
04:04continuing the execution.
04:06There was a moment when I started to think to myself, is this really
04:10what the rest of my life is going to be like?
04:12And then I get the phone call.
04:13And so and then here we are and my whole world turns upside down.
04:18And it's just been a crazy 75 days.
04:22What's run of mind for you?
04:24The next 30 days, the next year, the next five years?
04:28The first 60 days were a sprint.
04:30I'll tell you what I wanted to do, first and foremost, was to reengage
04:35with the team. So I spent the first 60 days and my first day in the
04:39office. I did an all employee meeting, brought everybody together,
04:41had a fireside chat so they could get to know me.
04:44We get to work in sports.
04:46We do.
04:47That we do, that we do.
04:51What are they telling you?
04:52What are you hearing?
04:53Where we're headed, which is around celebrating the passion and
04:56emotion of sport that excites them, that it that gets them motivated.
05:00That's what we have to do more of.
05:01That's when we're at our finest is when we put athletes at the center
05:05of everything we do.
05:06We take the insights from those athletes.
05:08That's what drives our product innovation pipeline.
05:12That that's what drives those emotional and inspiring stories that
05:16we tell. Those athlete stories have become synonymous with Nike's
05:20brand. Twenty six times I've been trusted to take the game winning
05:24shot and missed.
05:27From Michael Jordan and LeBron James to Serena Williams and Ronaldo
05:33Nazario.
05:35This is the Ronaldo pitch, as we call it, the Ronaldo field.
05:38And so to to celebrate him and all that he means to Nike, we we
05:43dedicated the pitch in his name.
05:45And then, of course, we have the statue here.
05:47And and we've been fortunate to continue our relationship with him,
05:51even beyond his playing days.
05:53Hill sees those athlete partnerships as a crucial element of Nike's
05:57past and future success.
05:59As Nike's vice president of Nike, he's been a key player in the
06:02NBA. As Nike's vice president of North America, Hill forged a strong
06:06partnership with Michael Jordan and was instrumental in encouraging
06:09the basketball legend to expand his brand globally.
06:12The strategy has paid off with sales growing to over seven billion
06:16dollars annually in 2024.
06:18Now Nike is looking ahead.
06:27We had Caitlin Clark here this morning, I think you saw that.
06:31So she was in yesterday working on her signature shoe that we'll
06:35launch and we're working on her logo and her design of her logo.
06:39She signed an eight year, twenty eight million dollar endorsement
06:43deal with Nike in April of last year, making it the largest
06:46sponsorship contract for a women's basketball player.
06:50What was the motivation behind that and what impact do you think it
06:52will have on women's sports, certainly on the WNBA?
06:55When we were running just basketball, we never got to the women's
06:59opportunity. But by having this small team that's focused on women's
07:03basketball, it unlocked, we believe, opportunities for the game of
07:10basketball, but also in product.
07:13It becomes an opportunity to grow the overall marketplace by inviting
07:17more and more girls into the world of sport.
07:20It is an area that we'll continue to invest in and we see tremendous
07:24momentum right now. Hill's new role comes at a critical time for Nike.
07:28Sales dropped in the last three quarters of 2024 and shares have slumped
07:33more than 43 percent since 2023.
07:36In an effort to clear out inventory, the company began offering massive
07:40discounts throughout the year, slashing prices by as much as 30
07:43percent. Hill says that approach has hurt the brand.
07:47You said in the December earnings call, your first as Nike CEO, that
07:52Nike has become too promotional, offering too many discounts.
07:55I'm certainly not complaining.
07:56But what's your vision for how Nike should approach pricing and discounts
08:00and still uphold its brand value and market position?
08:03There are moments in the traditional retail cycle where it makes sense to
08:08be promotional, Black Friday, Cyber Monday.
08:11But we had become too promotional in between those moments.
08:15We were even leveraging promotions to drive revenue.
08:18And frankly, that's not great for margin.
08:20It's not great for the brand.
08:21It's not great for our wholesale partners because, you know, they end up
08:25competing against us and profitability matters for them.
08:28And so starting this this spring, we've we're moving to a position where
08:32Nike Direct, both digital and physical, is going to actually lead the
08:36marketplace and be less not only less promotional, but elevate the
08:40experience that the consumer has with our brand.
08:43Nike also faced backlash over its direct-to-consumer sales strategy.
08:48Before the pandemic, it started to pull back from large wholesalers like
08:52Foot Locker and Dick's Sporting Goods to focus on its own brick and mortar
08:55stores and e-commerce.
08:57Now that strategy is changing.
09:01Pre-pandemic, Nike severed ties with retailers, wanted to focus more on
09:05direct-to-consumer.
09:07What are your plans to evolve, to rebuild your partnership with wholesale
09:12retailers like Foot Locker and so on?
09:14I think it all starts with the consumer.
09:15There are consumers that want to shop choice.
09:17Wholesale, either digital or physical.
09:20And the good news is this space that I spent a big part of my career.
09:24I have great relationships with our retailers, made it very, very clear to
09:28our team, first and foremost, that we were going to run a balanced
09:32marketplace. And I've had countless numbers of phone calls and meetings
09:36already with them, making certain that they understand the importance that
09:41they play to our brand and the development of our brand.
09:45That's been a great reception, by the way, from our retailers are saying,
09:49OK, Nike's back.
09:51Gone are the days of going wide.
09:53Hill wants to go deep, and he says Nike will be zeroed in on five main
09:57categories moving forward, running, basketball, training, football and
10:02sportswear. I live in Manhattan, I run in Central Park.
10:06I see a lot of people wearing Nike running shoes, but I also see on running.
10:09I see Hoka, right?
10:10A lot of these brands that I've eaten into Nike's market share.
10:13So what are your thoughts on how you go back to reestablishing yourself as
10:17the premium athletic brand?
10:19And what do you see as the number one driver for growth for Nike as we move
10:22forward?
10:23It does always come back to have new, different,
10:28innovative, coveted, beautiful product.
10:31The lineup that we have in running is the strongest
10:36lineup that that I've seen since I've been here, top to bottom, across the
10:40board. And we have to have those retail partners to
10:44help us take shelf space, open to buy and market share from our competitors,
10:48because frankly, that's we left it open.
10:51Ultimately, we have to earn our way back onto the shelves.
10:55It's that simple.
10:56You've repeatedly made this reference where you say we're going back to sport.
11:00Sport is at the heart of our brand.
11:01When I think of Nike, I think sports apparel.
11:04So what do you mean by that?
11:05We were running what we called the gender offense.
11:07So men's, women's and kids, we lost the sharpness around sport.
11:12And so we're reoriented in the organization to focus sport first.
11:16So think running, think basketball, think football or soccer and then gender
11:21second. By lining up by gender, it also helps us find opportunities specifically
11:26for that gender, whether it's color and material that's different for a man
11:30versus a woman.
11:31Another big focus for Hill is product innovation.
11:34This is the LeBron James Center, and it's all about advanced R&D and
11:41innovation. And it's without question, we believe one of the most foremost
11:46centers of innovation of athletic and human performance.
11:49Hill still recalls the 1988 unveiling of Nike's now famous Just Do It
11:54campaign. I'm thinking of being a lawyer.
11:57Just do it!
11:58He also led launches of footwear for elite athletes.
12:05But in recent years, critics, including investors, say Nike has fallen behind
12:09in the innovation race.
12:11What does product innovation look like for Nike as you move forward?
12:15We have a team of people that are already working on product in 28, 29.
12:19What's that look like? So long term, very futuristic innovation.
12:23The best innovation does come from an athlete.
12:25How to make you run faster, jump.
12:27Higher, be safer, move quicker.
12:32For Nike, many of those insights came from athlete partnerships.
12:37Nike's at its best when we have an athlete and we have a great relationship
12:39with that athlete. And we're able to partner with that athlete to take
12:43insights from their game, and in this case, obviously basketball, and to
12:48build the product around that individual's game.
12:51In this case, it happens to be LeBron James.
12:53He's very involved in the footwear that he wears and how it looks, how
12:58it fits, how it performs.
13:00Here's just a representation of some of the great executions that we've
13:05done with him.
13:06Few are as familiar as Hill with the history, people and inner workings
13:11of Nike. Despite three decades of experience and a clear enthusiasm for
13:15the CEO role, he has his work cut out for him.
13:18In your 60 days as a CEO, what have you learned about yourself?
13:21What have you learned about leadership?
13:22I have to be who I was always.
13:25I have to remain authentic.
13:29Just because I have a title and a new responsibility, it can't change how I
13:34show up, because I think if I do, people will see it, smell it, sniff it.
13:37And I've done some just real tactical things to try to do that.
13:41I mean, it sounds so simple, but I go get my own coffee in the morning and I
13:44go get my own coffee in the afternoon.
13:46I work out in our gyms here every morning and I move around the gyms and
13:50the coffee places so that I can interact with more and more of our
13:54teammates. You can't let a title or a new responsibility change who you are
13:59to your core. You have to show up as authentic, authentically yourself as
14:03you possibly can.