Nike sell Hurley
Overnight news out of Beaverton, Oregon, is that Nike have reached an agreement to sell Hurley to Bluestar Alliance LLC for an undisclosed amount.
Like the recent Rip Curl sale, it's been an open secret that Nike were looking to offload Hurley. At this stage Nike and Bluestar Alliance have formalised an agreement to sell, however the sale won't be completed till December.
“We appreciate how Bob and the Hurley team have built Hurley into the world’s most innovative surf brand,” said Nike's Michael Spillane via press release.
“As we drive increasingly more targeted investment and focused growth through Nike’s Consumer Direct Offense, this change in ownership will allow sharper focus and intentional investment in Hurley’s growth potential.”
And if anyone knows what that last sentence means, please enlighten us in the comments below.
Hurley International started in 1999 when Bob Hurley, then working for Billabong USA, decided not to renew Bong's US license instead launching his eponymous brand staffed by many of his ex-Billabong colleagues.
In 2002, Hurley was bought by Nike for an undisclosed amount, though they ran the company semi-autonomously. In recent years, Hurley has gone against the grain of other large surfwear companies: they never supported the Championship Tour in the way Rip Curl, Billabong, or Quiksilver did, sponsoring just one contest, Trestles - a deal they ended in 2017. This year they swooped in late to become 'presenting' sponsor of Teahupoo.
In 2014, Hurley exited SIMA - the Surf Industry Manufacturers Association - without offering an explanation.
Of all the large surfwear companies, Hurley has had the least investment in pro surfing and the surf industry at large, yet on the other hand they retained the largest team of sponsored riders, and also the most expensive. In 2013, they signed John John to a ten-year $40 million dollar deal.
Hurley's new owners are a private equity firm formed in 2002. They represent many other clothing companies, none of them surfwear.
“We have always admired the Hurley brand as it has maintained its leadership role and premium positioning in the surf world,” stated Joey Gabbay, CEO of Bluestar Alliance. “This is a transformative acquisition for Bluestar as Hurley’s international footprint will enhance Bluestar’s reach around the world. We look forward to building upon the existing Hurley network and expanding to additional countries with the deep relationships that already exist within the Bluestar portfolio of brands. We see Hurley continuing to evolve into a 360-degree lifestyle brand, with action sports playing a key role.”
The sale appears to end Nike's long and fractious relationship with surfing, which started in 1990 with Nike Aqua Gear and a bawdy shot of Laird in the buff. One of the great moments in surf advertising.
The timing was wrong for Aqua Gear, sporting 80s day-glo at the dawn of the 90s, and it soon folded.
As mentioned above, Nike bought Hurley in 2002, but then they formed Nike 6.0 in 2005, which incorporated surf and pitted them in direct competition with Hurley.
However, Nike 6.0 quit the surf industry in 2012 and their team of riders - young Jules, Kolohe, Carissa - all shifted over to Hurley.
And now that they've sold Hurley it's three attempts for three strikes.
Comments
beyond the corpo BS, will they cut the team?
Would say very probably for some, at least the smaller contracts.
Sorry to geek out a bit. PE firm comes in to try and turn around a dog of a business quickly (3-5 years) to flip it, so a lot of fat would quickly get shed. Kill the fancy offices in California, close the underperforming of the 27 stores they have. Then depends on how much they value marketing contribution of sponsorships (how much does the Kai Lenny contract really sell boardshorts to the kiddies, the Ace Buchan contract?). Hurley revenue in 2018 estimated at $275m, top contracts of $10-11m a year (ish?). So all other contracts and associated support call it about $13m (probably more). 50% wholesale margin on apparel gets 137.5m, and 13m then becomes a chunk of expenses. All this back of envelope.
I'm sure John John is pretty stoked his contract doesn't expire until end of 2024.
Reading the fine print would actually be an interesting read as far as Hurley/Nike contracts go.
All surfers are " independent contractors"
The people who work at )( may actually get medical/ benefits
The Surfers though are on there own.
As far as the highest paid surfer of all time not surfing for the better half of two years just screams ' performance review' ....
One of the biggest stories of the industry in two decades, goes largely unnoticed,
I think we are in for a Surf Culture Shock ' .
Hmmmm.......Beaverton !
The last sentence means "Divestment, bitchez!"
360 degree lifestyle brand .
Classic.
Just got given a Surfblanks Tee , I will wear it with pride . The fact most "sticker surfers" don't know the relevance of Surfblanks makes it even better to me .
Enjoy your day people .
Surfblanks are legends. Orange foam (2.69lbs/ft3) ftw
I'm 25 and I thought everything old in surf was cool until I saw that Laird ad.
Unfortunately, Laird is subject to the peculiar American affliction of being able to undermine amazing achievements and an otherwise unimpeachable legacy , purely with the dung which spills forth from between his own lips.
Sure looks peachy in the ad above, even without his lips moving.
'kin oath. You gotta love guys like Simon Anderson. A legend even if he hadn't invented the thruster, and yet he's one of the most humble, thoughtful, respectful and quietly spoken blokes you're ever likely to meet. When Simon has something to say people generally listen. MR is in the same category. There are a lot of Americans I can think of who could learn a thing or two by their example.
by the by, I thought Nike had sold Hurley a long time ago.
No sale yet, expect product quality to go way down .
Who will set the next industry standards.
It will not be any of the big 4 that is for sure.
"As we drive increasingly more targeted investment and focused growth through Nike’s Consumer Direct Offense, this change in ownership will allow sharper focus and intentional investment in Hurley’s growth potential.”
replaced with
" Hurley failed for us as an investment, we've moved on; the new owners are welcome to put their investment lipstick on the commercial pig that is surfing"
That's way more eloquent than me, I was thinking "Hurley is a dud, we are outta here..." ;-)
Well done but not quite a cigar as you made the fatal sin of using punctuation.
Nike boardroom analysis:
Nike President: "Okay, team, I want your 5 second elevator pitch on this Hurley thing"
Fifteen Vice Presidents (of sales, marketing , branding, strategy, product development, finance, future proofing etc.) pipe up in unison:
"darn those surfies are hard to monetize"
President: "I concur, sell it to that Ziff guy or some other sucker".
Will Bob be getting his second set of golden handcuffs for staying at Hurley? If so that is a wonderful achievement. No doubt he does not really need the money anyway - but might as well take it.
Isnt Hollister the most successful surf brand ?
It's amazing how you think you've purged an image from your mind, and then wham! There's Laird in that Nike again.
Yes I quickly glazed over that on lest my eyes were burnt.
Nike are dogs.
Corporate virtue ..........
Hurley are probably better off without being associated with them...
"...By "siding with the Chinese Communist Party and silencing free speech, the NBA is acting like a wholly owned subsidiary of the authoritarian regime," Pence said.
Nike stores in China removed Rockets merchandise after Beijing criticized Morey, Pence noted.
"Nike promotes itself as a so-called social-justice champion, but when it comes to Hong Kong, it prefers checking its social conscience at the door," he said.
Pence said "far too many American multinational corporations have kowtowed to the lure of China's money and markets by muzzling not only criticism of the Chinese Communist Party, but even affirmative expressions of American values.""
https://news.yahoo.com/amphtml/pence-takes-aim-china-hong-160205110.html
"...He also slammed China for its treatment of Muslim Uighurs in the Xinjiang region."
Seriously, where's all the do-gooders from CNN, Wa-Po, NYT, etc. regarding China's treatment of Uygher Muslims?
This is the living, breathing embodiment of 'islamaphobia', a term they constantly throw around flippantly .....or did ...and yet, barely a word from sjw central... This shit should be front page news daily.
China literally has nazi like concentration camps, with live harvesting of organs for millionaires - bule ones included - yet somehow, bewilderingly, it's trump that is likened to Hitler on a daily basis. Not a single word of criticism for Xi
The world is all messed up...
In no way am I saying that any human rights abuses are ok. Clearly they are not.
But perhaps, to not come across as biased, you could also mention some of the atrocities currently perpetuated by the west, and perhaps add some comment that contextualise the extent of death that arises, for say, the like of financial weapons, or extra-judicial drone killings, or regime change, or corporate psychic colonisation, and the like.
That said, I throughly appreciate you raising these issues.
Thanks for the respectful response Mr. Stone, but, with respect, I don't see how stating these facts is remotely bias, it is what it is. Both sides of politics fucked this shit up...
"... For years, our leaders had yawned about Silk Road neo-imperialism in Africa and Asia, and gross abuses of human rights against Chinese religious minorities and political dissidents.
Almost every assumption Washington made, both by Democratic and Republican administrations, was logically flawed at best. And at worst, these calculations were a weird mix of conservative commercial greed, liberal political correctness and shared screwball naivete.
American trade and political appeasement were never interpreted by Beijing as magnanimity to be reciprocated, but always as weakness to be exploited. It was always ludicrous to think that the more concessions on trade and human rights the United States gave, the more China would Westernize and begin to resemble America or an EU nation."
"...But by then, American corporations were so addicted to laissez-faire profit-making that they turned a blind eye and paid their hush money.
Universities cashed in too, both by setting up lucrative satellite campuses in China and admitting tens of thousands of Chinese citizens. These Chinese students paid full tuition (and sometimes premiums and surcharges), turning once cash-strapped campuses into profitable degree mills.
Most college deans and presidents simply ignored the dreadful human rights record of China, not to mention occasional expatriate espionage rings designed to steal engineering and high-tech research."
"...If profits had blinded corporations to exploitive Chinese partnerships, political correctness conveniently offered academia and the media political cover -- as if a mostly monoracial China was a 1.3 billion-person diverse "other" with historical grievances against a supposedly racist America.
The result was that everyone profited and all remained willfully blind to the ascendant cutthroat and dictatorial colossus."
"..Academics could not have cared less that the deplorables and the working classes were being wiped out, given their politically incorrect social and cultural views."
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.realcle...
The world is in this position due to extreme greed and naivete at best, from both sides...
I find the parallels with australia most interesting to say the least. Corrupted culture, norms, universities, institutions generally, and worst of all 'the left' of politics in both nations.
I don't expect 'the right' of politics to call this shit out - this is what they do - yet somehow they are. But I do expect the left to call this shit out, that is their role, or once was....
But the left have been so indoctrinated and outright brainwashed with academia's obsession with IP it has made it near impossible for them to do so.
The whole left/right model is broken, and it appears the world generally as a result...
...and nike are one of the biggest dog offenders in this episode of 'brokeness'.
then we should talk about the ongoing indigenous problem in Australia and how the Chinese own our Aussie Butts .......yep the world is really messed up ask the Kurds who are now signing an agreement with Iran.....as Donald recently said " something BIG just happened!" ....or about too!
"China literally has .... live harvesting of organs for millionaires - bule ones included"
Got a reference for that Sypkan? That's some fucked up shit.
It is some fucked up shit yocal!
I've seen it alluded to in a couple of places, but the most convincing no bullshit account was in blowin's trade war vid
https://m.
the guy was an american government representative who lived and breathed china for a few years, he has recently written a book which I must look into.
he knows of billionaires/millionaires flying in to take advantage of china's uygher live organ supermarket. shop til you drop whilst 'the product' is maintained on life support
Its a long vid, so if u don't have time it's about 15-20 mins in from memory. I advise you to watch the whole vid, it explains a lot about this messed up place we are now in. should be compulsory viewing for the whole western world (and china!!)
aside from about 10 mins. of it where they try to blame china for america's opiod crisis, the whole vid is gold and essential viewing.
And then there was this unauthorised desecration...
You really wonder if this makes any difference and did it need to be said. No Nuts Nike.
“We can’t figure out how to sell to core surfers & we sure as shit can’t use core surfers to sell to non-surfers. See ya.”
So that Nike Aqua Gear ad ran about the same time Gash ran their ads?
Im not into labels/brands, but if the missus buys me surf clothing most i will wear, but you couldn't pay me to wear Nike or Hurley, to me they are both just cringe worthy type brands, especially Nike trying to cash in on Surfing and Skateboarding.
We'll put.......
Hmmm...
Ouch!
hahahahahahahha...
"yo, boss, ... the Aussies have killed our brand... sell sell sell"
The time that customers were allowed to customise the lettering on their shoes:
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2001/feb/19/1
Ha...reminds me of David Thorne.
Some favourite email chains:
Obvious foggot
Free Burton snowboard
Amazing. I had forgotten this guy. Love his work... now to waste the rest of my day reading his hilarity again
That is pure gold, got lost in there for ages, so funny
Great link
Awesome.
They dumped Hurley, just like they dumped Nike golf, Nike snowboarding.
They shed almost half their employees at " the campus"
a while back.
Hurley if managed well might survive......
The biggest thing I see is that nike has almost no hope of surfing impact in the Olympics.
Looks like they have interest in the US skateboard team though.
Salts and suits and the USA' s biggest surf brand.
I can see another book looming :)
Hopefully, hurley will die a horrible public death...
hang on, another death after the photo ofPrime Minister scott morrison (never give him the privilege of a friendly nickname).
The corporates can go fuck themselves.
Because they are just brainwashing our kids with everything that is valueless in the world.
Its rebuttals like this that make me wish I never commented in the first place.
A strong reminder advertisers actually used to use WORDS in ads.
Although "Let X=Laird, such that X wears really cool nike aqua gear" is a really atrocious concept and copywriting
“As we drive increasingly more targeted investment and focused growth through Nike’s Consumer Direct Offense, this change in ownership will allow sharper focus and intentional investment in Hurley’s growth potential.”
And if anyone knows what that last sentence means, please enlighten us in the comments below.
It means: "It's not you, it's me"
Sentence means " Wish we didn't buy it , it is a dog. Don't intend to invest one more dollar in it. Sell at any price"
Salts and Suits anyone?
Vince met Bob at G-land once, and thought he was a very nice down to earth bloke, despite Vince's belligerence and ignorance
What it means is...."homey don't play dat".
(Direct Offence): A faster pipeline to 80% of Nike's market share, that being 12 Key cities across 10 key countries.(No! Don't bother, tbb already checked!)
New York, London, New York, Shanghai, Beijing, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Paris, Berlin, Mexico City, Barcelona, Seoul and Milan
https://news.nike.com/news/nike-consumer-direct-offense
(Intentional Investment): No more Surfs Up! ...get Nike running back on trackie dacks.
tbb's Top 12 translation: (trackie dacks) Bogandolequeuewear worn with Nike Uggz.
https://www.impactfiduciary.com/blog/2018/4/13/intentional-investing
*When both terms are used in one sentence, it means you're sacked.
Nike CEO eg:
"A pair of Nike shoelaces are worth more than a shitty little Olympic Surfing ticket."
"Olympic Skegz are dragging down our Metro Olympic Range, referred to as (MOR)."
"Be sure to dump leftover Skeg'z Olympic merch' in a sea of desert island sales bins."
"Just do it !!! ...Now I said !!! ..."WTF !!!"... [ GONE SURFING ]
"Bogandolequeuewear."
- TBB
Fooken unbelievable .......LOL.