Three years ago, Nike executives touted “strong growth” across Converse and Jordan Brand. Now, both are declining by double digits — and so is China.

When Nike veteran Elliott Hill was tapped to take on the CEO role two years ago, the headlines largely revolved around a DTC strategy that had gone too far, leaving wholesale partners feeling abandoned and allowing competitors a chance to gain a stronger foothold at retail.

Also at issue was an overly generous distribution strategy that flooded the market with some of Nike’s core footwear franchises — namely the Air Force 1, Air Jordan and Dunk — denting their cool factor.

At the time, Hill had a simple answer to these problems: “Let’s see more of Nike being Nike.” A turnaround required the sportswear giant to refocus its organization on sport, accelerate product innovation, reset its core footwear franchises and reignite its relationship with wholesale partners.

The company — which had already cut about 2% of its workforce earlier that year — announced additional layoffs in 2025, this time amounting to less than 1% of its workforce, as Hill restructured the company around key sports versus consumer demographics. These cuts would set Nike “up to win,” a spokesperson said at the time.

Except that wasn’t the end of it either. Nike’s latest earnings report included another operational reset , which calls for an unspecified number of layoffs in the new year. And Nike’s problems have now grown to include more than just DTC and some oversupplied franchises.

Source link