Nike spent twenty years paying Mbappé to wear shoes. Now they're not. On—a company that makes running shoes for people who describe their personality as "half-marathons"—signed him instead. First soccer player they've ever signed. Historic stuff.
Mbappé terminates a two-decade partnership to join a brand most famous for making overpriced foam rectangles that dentists wear to brunch. On's entire marketing strategy has been "what if shoes, but Swiss?" Now they've got the world's fastest soccer player selling that vision to people who think Cristiano Ronaldo is a type of pasta.
This marks On's aggressive expansion into sports where you can't just jog in a straight line looking contemplative. Bold move for a company whose previous athlete portfolio could be described as "tech executives training for Tough Mudder." They looked at their balance sheet and thought, we need someone who appeals to markets outside of Palo Alto wellness retreats.
Nike's response will be carefully worded and meaningless. They'll mention mutual respect and different directions and wish him well. What they won't mention is that some marketing VP just got a performance review that reads like a suicide note. Twenty years of brand equity, gone. Traded for a company that sounds like a placeholder name in a pitch deck.
Retail traders are already scanning ticker symbols. Googling "On stock price." Refreshing their Robinhood app like it's a slot machine. Typing "is this bullish for footwear?" into Reddit at 2 a.m. They're convinced this signals some seismic shift in athletic sponsorships. It doesn't. It signals that Mbappé's agent negotiated a better deal and Nike decided shoes are shoes.
On gets their first soccer star. Nike loses a French forward. The global economy remains unaffected. Your portfolio is still bleeding because you bought GameStop at $340, not because of this.
Photo by Hen Kaznelson on Unsplash
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