Nike At 50

Last week, Nike shared a letter from its founder Phil Knight. In which he celebrated the 50th anniversary of a make-or-break moment in the history of the apparel maker. On 1 May 1972, Onitsuka, the Japanese shoemaker whose shoes Knight had been selling in the US, cancelled their contract.

"What could have been a gut punch, was a royal kick in the butt that pushed us forward," Knight recounts. The company looked for alternative suppliers to produce their own branded shoes. "We had a dream, our love for sports, a ton of ambition, a trunk full of running shoes, and a big swoosh on all of them." he writes.

Nike was soon born with its first shoes carrying the iconic swoosh. Back in 1972, Blue Ribbon Sports (now Nike) was making 1.3 million in annual sales, 50 years later Nike is the world's largest sports apparel company with $44.5 billion in yearly sales. Today, it only takes Nike about 15 minutes to match what it sold in a year in 1972.

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