Nike’s Hometown Ignores Boycott Call

Karl Colbert accompanied his friend shopping at the Nike shoe factory outlet near downtown here Wednesday, unfazed by the recent call for a national boycott of Nike products.

“I like Nikes, and I don’t like other people telling me what to do,” said the black 14-year-old Jefferson High School student.

The boycott call by the Chicago-based civil rights organization Operation PUSH has so far fallen flat in Portland, the home of Nike Corp., the largest manufacturer of athletic shoes in the nation.

PUSH contends that Nike denies blacks adequate employment and business opportunities. But local leaders of the NAACP, the Urban League and the Black United Front contend that PUSH has not done its homework.

The Chicago group, founded by Jesse Jackson in 1971, did not contact them before launching the boycott, and “maybe that has something to do with the lack of support locally,” said Daryll Tukufu, head of Portland’s Urban League.

When a chartered Operation PUSH bus arrived at the Nike head office Monday in Beaverton, a nearby suburb of Portland, the majority of protesters who got off the bus were from Chicago. Just four people were from Portland.

The Rev. Tyrone Crider, the new executive director of PUSH, gathered his members in prayer. He invoked the spirit of activists Harriet Tubman and Rosa Parks, saying, “We will no longer stand by and allow apartheid corporate policies.” But locally, Nike seems to get high marks for its “social responsibility.”

Local black leaders point to the Nike factory outlet built on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in a predominantly black neighborhood. The Black United Front, a local organization, persuaded Nike to open the store five years ago. Profits from it go to a community development corporation that trains carpenters to rehabilitate abandoned housing. Once renovated, the houses are sold to low-income people.

“While other stores are pulling out and closing down stores in the area, Nike has just renewed their lease,” said Tukufu.

Last fall, Nike donated $100,000 to the House of Umoja, a new anti-gang youth program that is modeled after one in Philadelphia.

“We try to support real neighborhood development, things that are meaningful,” said Nike spokesperson Liz Dolan. “But we are not an economic development corporation. We spend most of our time trying to sell shoes.”

“You wish (PUSH) did their homework a little more,” said Robert Phillips, president of Portland’s NAACP. “We just wish PUSH found out where the ancillary dollars are being spent. You just don’t go after Nike because it is the largest of the largest; you go after the worst of the worst.

“You have to wonder what the real issue is,” Phillips said. “Nike hasn’t done anything for the NAACP, so I have no reason to wave their flag. But is the issue a corporate lack of responsibility, or is it an attempt to provide recognition and focus on a new leader and his organization? I don’t know.”

Dolan admitted that the company is not perfect. All of the vice presidents are white--but all have been there at least 10 years. “Senior management at Nike flows up from the bottom. That’s how it’s done here,” she said.

However, with all the media attention, President Phil Knight said last week that Nike would name a minority to the board of directors within one year and a minority vice president within two.

Crider, at the steps of Nike headquarters, said the timetable is too long. Referring to Nike’s TV commercials, he said, “It didn’t take 24 months to find Michael Jordan or Spike Lee; it doesn’t take 24 months to find a qualified African American for a vice president.”

And, apparently unwavering, Crider jabbed at Portland’s black leadership Monday night at a church rally, saying, “The Negroes out there don’t know there is a movement here.”

Phillips said PUSH might have pushed too far and may founder.

Tukufu of the Urban League agrees. “You get all the media attention in the first week. You have to see some stirrings after that. I don’t see it in Portland; I haven’t heard about it in Chicago or anywhere else. Frankly, I don’t see where the boycott is taking off.”

But Crider predicted that boycott results won’t be evident for a while. “People make athletic purchases every 90 to 120 days. That’s when we will see if purchases go down.”