Following up on a story we posted yesterday– According to the SF Gate, a Nike representative called Arien O’Connell early this morning and said that they would award her a trophy as well as the same prize awarded to the “elite” winner of the Nike Women’s Marathon.
Importantly, the representative said that they would also be eliminating the Elite field from future Nike Women’s Marathons, a decision I wholeheartedly agree with. Here’s the link to Nike’s full statement- (apparently posted on a User Forum, not an official press release.)
As I said in the comments of the previous story, I really believe that Nike is missing out on an opportunity to turn this into PR gold. Everyone loves a Cinderella story, and what better way to recognize the accomplishments of “Arien and other athletes who surpass their goals and achieve great accomplishments” than to give her a more than a Tiffany bowl and the sloppy-seconds, first-place title than to also feature her in a marketing campaign?
2 responses so far ↓
1 Margaret // Oct 23, 2008 at 2:01 pm
The official press release is included in this article from Runner’s World http://dailyviews.runnersworld.com/2008/10/in-sf-fastest-t.html
2 Smurf // Oct 23, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Well, to be a PR nitpicker- that’s not a press release. That’s a statement they released on their website.
They DID put out a press release announcing the “winner” (the woman with a slower time):
http://www.nikebiz.com/media/pr/2008/10/19_Marathon.html
But did not put out a press release regarding Arien or lessons learned (see previous postst that I think they really missed out on a PR goldmine here.)
IMO, they should have trumpeted this just as loudly. Instead, they just kinda slipped it out there. No doubt the hope was that media that wasn’t already following the story wouldn’t say, ‘Wait, hang on, what happened here?!” But, the fact of the matter is that only the media that WERE already following were likely to continue following, and making it right with those audiences demands a little more than a statement posted on a message board.
Leave a Comment