I remember watching the 2006 BCS National Championship game with a friend who happened to be a manager for an Adidas store at the time. The game was the most memorable college football game I’ve ever seen, with Vince Young putting on a super human performance to lead Texas over Matt Leinart, Reggie Bush, and the USC Trojans. Despite the memorable match-up, all my friend could keep talking about was all the “swooshes” he was seeing. He was referencing the Nike logos on both team’s jerseys. It was sort of understandable, since this was a guy who if he heard anyone say Nike while he was working, would ask, “Did you just use the “N” word?” Say what you want about the man, but he was damn dedicated to his company.
I couldn’t help but be reminded of that evening five years ago while watching last night’s Auburn-Oregon game. Oregon tied the game with over two minutes left with a touchdown and a two-point conversion, but Auburn methodically drove down the field to kick a field goal as time expired. It wasn’t as epic of a contest as the previously mentioned Texas-USC tilt, but still a great game that met all expectations going in. Most people were probably focused on this match-up. I couldn’t help but notice that the swooshes were joined by a funny looking logo. This clash pitted the long-time dominator of athletic shoes and apparel (Nike) against a 15-year old rival whose origins are very similar to how Nike began (Under Armour).
Under Armour was founded by former University of Maryland football player Kevin Plank in 1996. Along with a former teammate, Plank began the new company from his grandmother’s basement in Washington D.C. A year later, Plank grew his revenues from $17,000 to $100,000. A front page picture of former Raiders quarterback Jeff George wearing an Under Armour mock turtleneck first introduced the company to the masses (who knew that Jeff George would be partly responsible for something other than having an awful moustache when he was a rookie and screaming at his coach in 1996 and getting suspended for the rest of the season while he was on the Falcons). Improbably, the big break for the company was Jamie Foxx wearing an Under Armour jockstrap in “Any Given Sunday” (it does make sense that a jockstrap would be more valuable in the back story of a company than Jeff George). Ever since 2000, Under Armour has slowly been expanding their product line, and in a similar fashion as Nike’s strategy, has begun signing top athletes as endorsers, with none bigger than Tom Brady (if I was a homer, I would’ve mentioned Miles Austin, but I’ll put it in parentheses to make the statement seem less serious). In 2008, Under Armour began outfitting some colleges with athletic gear. In 2009, they inked Auburn University.
Nike has been keeping a close eye on Under Armour for the better part of the last decade. There origins are very similar to Under Armour (founder Phil Knight used to sell shoes at track meets out of the trunk of his car, while co-founder Bill Bowerman used a waffle iron to create the game-changing waffle outsole). They even train their associates to give a speech about how Nike’s compression wear is more durable than Under Armour’s. Nike’s been kicking Adidas’ ass for years, but they recognize that this new upstart is different. Under Armour only does less than 10% of the revenue Nike, but they have become a hip brand with kids across the nation. They may not persuade a bunch of middle-aged men to make a switch, but eventually the kids they are appealing to now will be middle-aged men with kids of their own.
This is where we need to bring up the University of Oregon. Oregon could be renamed “Nike College”, as it’s the alma mater of the aforementioned Knight and Bowerman. Stationed close to Nike’s headquarters, Oregon has developed into a testing ground for Nike. Starting in 2006 (ironically enough, right around the time when Under Armour was beginning to air television ads), Nike began designing radical new uniforms for Oregon. The Ducks wore 9 different combinations in the 2006 season alone. Most of them featured neon yellow quite prominently, which irked some alumni. The suits at Nike weren’t concerned about the alumni when making these uniforms, they were thinking about kids. Oregon has been transformed into the university of cool, and Nike’s swoosh is all over it. It didn't take them long to realize that Under Armour was a threat, and they needed to react quickly to strike back in the battle for America’s youth.
This back-story made Monday’s game that much more interesting. There was Oregon, in the most important football game in the program’s history, trotting out onto the field in uniforms they had never worn before (they were specially designed by Nike for this game). Auburn was wearing their traditional blue jerseys, a stark contrast to the space-age garb being worn by the opposition (don’t give Under Armour any credit for this. According to an ESPN.com article published last month, they have proposed multiple alternate uniforms, but Auburn has refused in order to stick with tradition). If you didn’t know any better, and you had to pick which school was equipped by the young upstart sportswear company, you would’ve picked Oregon.
Will Auburn’s victory have an immediate impact in the sportswear industry? It probably won’t in the short term. Under Armour has Auburn plastered all over their homepage right now, but I doubt millions of people will chuck their Nike’s in the dumpster and purchase Under Armour sneakers. It will be interesting to see what this sector of the economy looks like in 20 years. Their journey from a grandmother’s basement to the outfitter of the national championship football team in 15 years has been remarkable. As long as they continue to add high caliber athletes to endorse their product, and they continue to expand their product line (or in other words, follow the Nike blueprint), they should be in great shape.
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