If it weren't for the fact that thousands of manufacturers all over the developed world are diligently and relentlessly reducing their carbon emmissions, contributions to landfills and wasted energy of all sorts through their commitment to lean, I wouldn't care too much what the self-indulgent crowd at Nike is up to. But I know too many manufacturers making the plant and their communities genuinely better places to let the latest from these charlatans go unchallenged.
Nike is looking for a "Code For A Better World Fellow" – a title so goofy only an outfit like Nike could dream it up. The person they want to hire will "work in Nike's Sustainable Business and Innovation team." The fellow will work with "Nike's data managers to landscape current data and craft a desired future state; manage the formatting and release of data to the open data community; curate use of the data within the community; bring knowledge from the open data community back to Nike as actionable steps; attend conferences related to open data to grow Nike's network and profile in this space; and ultimately create/steward the creation of prototypes that demonstrate how opening Nike's sustainability data can be a force to drive change." The goal of all of this is to create "future where creation of products isn't tied to scarce natural resources like water and oil; where manufacturing is lean, green, equitable and empowered; and where everyone, everywhere has access to sport." That language is so fundamentally stupid it is hard to imagine serious business people wrote it -but at Nike words are far more important than reality.
Regardless, Nike – no need to pay anyone else. I'm your fellow. I have already found the 'current data' and found data in the 'open community' to get the job done!
According to your own data, 94% of your shoes are made in Vietnam, China and Indonesia. According to the UK Telegraph, at last check these countries rank 90th, 84th and 82nd out of 141 on the list of the greenest and most livable countries – compared to numbers like 23rd in the USA, 25th in the UK, and 8th in Australia – the places you sell your shoes. Throw a little more 'open data' into the mix – according to Google Earth you ship the shoes about 7,000 miles from where you make them to where you sell them. That means those Nike trainers leave a pretty deep carbon footprint. If you want to be sure "manufacturing is lean, green, equitable and empowered," you might want to quit ducking the environmental regulations in the developed nations where you sell your shoes by having them made in some of the worst polluting places on earth. You maybe could think about saving the energy you burn to transport the shoes halfway around the globe.
A little more data – you pay kids 50 cents an hour in Vietnam – less in China and Indonesia - while your low end shoes go for sixty bucks. That isn't going to give "everyone, everywhere has access to sport" – at least not access to sport wearing Nike shoes while they play. That Vietnamese kid would have to work for three weeks to buy your shoes. Put another way, sixty bucks for a pair of shoes to a Vietnamese kid is the equivalent of charging Americans $1,400 a pair – a tad beyond most folks reach.
So there you have it Nike – make the shoes in the responsible environmental regions where you sell 'em. Pay kids in the third world the same wages Americans, Europeans Canadians and Aussies make, and let ' em make shoes for their own country they can affords to buy. Just like you asked – I combined your data and open access data, and figured out a simple way for you to make manufacturing 'lean and green', and to give kids everywhere 'access to sport'. And I didn't even need to do any of that "disruptive, radical, jaw-dropping innovation" you're looking for.
But perhaps Nike isn't really looking for a solution all – perhaps they don't really care about the environment or third world kids access to sport. Perhaps Nike saw increasing concern for the health of the planet and health of its inhabitants as an opportunity to be taken advantage of, a chance to spin themselves into a position to sell more shoes. I'm pretty sure that's the case, else they would accept the cost of of environmentally compliant manufacturing and pay people enough to afford Nike products.
It is becoming increasingly obvious that there are two sorts of companies these days. The Nikes who view social problems as something to use for their advantage, and those who see the need to protect the environment and the need to create healthy lives for people as serious obligations – requiring the hard work of actually becoming lean and green, and committing to their employees and communities.
if you read Evolving Excellence, odds are you are among the latter and you should be proud of yourselves. If you work for Nike, you should be ashamed to admit it.
Jim Fernandez says
Bill:
You nailed it !!
This new “fellow” will:
1. “create “future where everyone, everywhere has access to sport.”
2. Use terms like “scarce natural resources like water and oil”, “ lean, green, equitable and empowered”.
3. “attend conferences related to open data to grow Nike’s network and profile in this space”
4. “craft a desired future state; and release of data to the open data community”
5. And he will be working in “Nike’s Sustainable Business team.”
LITNE says
I don’t even know what all Nike’s BS language about “open data” means, but after reading your post, my Nike’s died of embarassment and burst into flame. Great, now I’m barefoot and blistered…;-)
Mark Welch says
The ultimate con is when one doesn’t know he’s been conned. Nike is quite good at this, but you’ve called them out quite well, Bill.
“You cannot serve both God and money.” Matthew 6:24.
Nike has made their choice, but I doubt God was ever in the picture to begin with.
Bryan says
Hi Bill,
Thanks for the translation. I couldn’t make any sense this foreign language. Is that how they speak in Vietnam?
Speaking of which, you were probably too optimistic in your assessment of VN wages. The low end of the pay is somewhere around VND830K. That means a $60 pair of leathers is going to require about 1.5 months of work for a Vietnamese Nike Fellow to have access to sport, not three, but hey – let’s not split hairs when it comes to exploitation.
Nike, however, isn’t the only culprit in this matter at keeping wages artificially low. I read that a monthly salary cap of VND500K is put on dependents of a family in Vietnam. That is about 1 pair of Air Kobe’s per month. By the end of the year, VN workers can look forward to some really awesome company basketball league tournaments after their daily 14 hr shift!
Also, the post Tet holiday is forcing urban manufacturing centers to become more competitive in wages since tens of thousands of workers never return to the cities. This phenomena, in combination with rising costs of living in cities, will bring wages up to where they need to be over time, if manufacturers are serious about being in Vietnam and other developing countries for that matter.
Jeff Adams says
Damn!…I love this blog. Thanks for providing perspective as always.
An open debate says
A little intellectually dishonest, Bill.
First, Nike doesn’t pay these workers anything. That is because no one, in ANY of these factories, is a Nike employee. The only Nike factories are located in the US. All other labor is contracted. So what you’re really bemoaning is the outsourcing of manufacturing to Asia.
Now, clearly, there is a reason for this – as you point out. Labor is cheaper overseas, which is why every single Fortune 500 company that produces consumer goods has their manufacturing infrastructure in Asia. This is an issue, but certainly not one limited to Nike. Nike faced serious, and well deserved, criticism in the late 1990’s for its poor oversight of its vendor partners. Today, it is an industry leader in factory oversight, wages, and worker treatment, and no vendor factory employs children.
You may say, and rightfully so, that the problem remains – it is an unsustainable model, both environmentally and from a humanitarian standpoint. I agree. But how do you change that model? Nike is undoubtedly ahead of the pack in these efforts. Few companies, if any, are moving for aggressively towards genuinely sustainable manufacturing. Nike’s multimillion dollar Considered Design index was just released to the entire apparel industry, in an effort to share strides in sustainable manufacturing, and get input on how to improve it. Over 300 companies have already adopted it. This is unheard of for a publically traded company, and an example of the power of “open data.”
We can stand on the outside looking in, shouting for companies to return their profits and revert towards cottage industry product creation. Perhaps we’ll be forced to do so before we can decide. However, until then, shouldn’t we support strong efforts in the field, and constantly prod and encourage industry leaders to perfect their approach and stay good to their sustainability commitments? After all, consumers are the only people corporations listen to.
Bill Waddell says
There’s a hoot – an anonynous poster accusing me of intellectual dishonesty because the impoverished people making Nike’s in amysmal environments are technically not Nike employees – they are contractors. In what universe is that a distinction with a difference?
The rationalization for Nike’s behavior – all Fortune 500 companies do it, therefore Nike must do it too.
Pathetic … simply pathetic.
How about if Nike returns manufacturing to the countries in which they sell their shoes? It is wholesale ignorance of manufacturing to believe that low labor cost matters – wholesale ignorance of the Fortune 500 sort where people who know the first thing about maufacturing are hard to come by in the “C” suites. Nike is all about finance and marketing. Making things is the furthest thing down their priority list.
“Shouldn’t we support strong efforts in the field” to make the Nike model work? Not a chance. Nike should support strong efforts to manufature effectively, strong efforts to knock off the hypocracy, and strong efforts to quit submitting anonymous PR comments like this one to justify their behavior.