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Nike gets enough promotion and publicity through their blatant branding and the unbelievably ridiculous overuse of their famous check mark logo, plus silly but catchy sign-post sayings like Just Do it.
Well, I've done it, all right. And in the process, I've unwittingly become...THE ULTIMATE NIKE NERD!!!!!!
On one recent adventure that had absolutely nothing to do with playing sports, watching them or otherwise caring about them or what I might be wearing to suggest I was at all sports-inclined, I got into my car and fumbled for my keys.
My spirit sank as I noticed I was wearing the following items:
1. Nike socks with the checkmark logo on them
2. Nike black shorts with the checkmark logo on them
3. Nike shirt with the checkmark logo on it
4. Adidas runners with their logo on them
5. If I could remember what underwear I had on, I would tell you. What I know is that they were NOT NIKE!
Now, the fact is I AM an athletic, sports-minded person. But this self-discovery flew in the face of everything I've ever valued or tried to pass on to my kids or others, if they should ask my opinion.
We are SO overrun with horrible, self-serving promotion and branding by the gigantic corporations. You can't watch any sports event (aside from the Olympics and the Masters golf tournament) without being force-fed the Nike logo or the American Express card or Viagra or WalMart or whatever.
"This pitching change is brought to you by..."
Even the schools, supposedly those last bastions of truly advertising-free, objective environments, have allowed computer companies to come in and advertise in return for free computers.
We can't escape it, anywhere, this mad frenzy towards buy, buy, buy. Consumerism consumes all.
But I thought I had avoided that. I would purposely buy clothes that did NOT make me a walking ad for some company. And I would not buy such products that did make their products all about their branding, rather than their usefulness or value.
But here, thanks to what I now believe must have been several different shopping excursions where I could not avoid this plague, I had become everything I despised: a walking billboard for Nike.
Where can I go to hide...
