More on Nike's "epic saga of value destruction" (Nike has its lowest share price since 2018, - 32% since the beginning of 2024):

The trouble began after Donahoe, the former of C.E.O. of Bain and eBay, then ServiceNow, the cloud computing company, decided to end Nike’s relationships with several wholesale partners—including Zappos, DSW, and Dillards—to focus on its direct-to-consumer business. Theoretically, this made sense. On some level, Nike is a luxury brand, like Apple or Dior, and it should be sold direct for all the obvious reasons—relentless focus on the product and narrative, scarcity, vertical integration, harvesting data, etcetera.

But unlike the luxury market, where multibrand retail continues to contract, outlets like Dick’s Sporting Goods or Zappos offer an essential and convenient service. If you stop selling via Zappos, for example, it’s not like all those sales are suddenly going to funnel to Nike.com. (Beauty works similarly—look at the dominance of Sephora and Ulta.) By pulling back from normie wholesalers, Nike made room for Hoka and On, among others, to snag market share. Deckers, which owns Hoka, has seen its stock rise 73 percent over the past year. On’s shares are up 18 percent. (Read More: Nike’s distribution snafu covers over a far more significant mistake).