{"id":10131,"date":"2016-11-03T23:53:36","date_gmt":"2016-11-04T03:53:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digital.hbs.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/running-to-discover-sustainable-solutions-how-nike-is-fighting-to-win-the-climate-change-game\/"},"modified":"2016-11-03T23:53:36","modified_gmt":"2016-11-04T03:53:36","slug":"running-to-discover-sustainable-solutions-how-nike-is-fighting-to-win-the-climate-change-game","status":"publish","type":"hck-submission","link":"https:\/\/d3.harvard.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/running-to-discover-sustainable-solutions-how-nike-is-fighting-to-win-the-climate-change-game\/","title":{"rendered":"Running to Discover Sustainable Solutions: How Nike is Fighting to Win the Climate Change Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1998 Chairman and CEO of Nike, Phil Knight, said, \u201cThe Nike product has become synonymous with slave wages, forced overtime and arbitrary abuse [1].\u201d\u00a0 Today Nike is recognized as a leader of sustainability in the retail industry, signing the White House pledge against climate change, and even experiencing ratings upgrades from Wall Street analysts based on their sustainability performance [2] [3].\u00a0 While their reputation has clearly made a U-turn, the question remains: can Nike take their game to the next level?<\/em><\/p>\n

The League: Retail\u2019s Role in Climate Change<\/strong><\/p>\n

The retail industry is at a unique intersection of opportunity and threat from climate change. Some threats are immediately apparent: adverse weather events caused by climate change may result in store or factory closures translating to immediate sales loss. \u00a0Nike experienced this in 2008 when flooding in Thailand caused temporary closure of four factories, while companies such as IKEA, impacted by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, lost $9M from store closures [4] [5]. Less apparent threats include the upstream impact of availability of raw materials as well as regulations impacting operational practices including energy efficiency, water use, and the disposal of waste [6] [7]. While risky to retailers\u2019 business models, these threats also translate into opportunities to differentiate and develop reputational advantage.<\/p>\n

The Game Plan: Nike Sustainability Initiatives<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since the late 1990s Nike has worked to embed environmental and labor related metrics into the structure of the organization; Chief Sustainability Officer, Hannah Jones, describes this journey, \u201c[sustainability] moved from being a risk and reputation function to being a business lever function to being an innovation function [8].\u201d Today the company looks at impact across its entire value chain on an ongoing basis. Figure 1 below from Nike\u2019s 2014\/2015 Sustainable Business Report depicts the proportional environmental impact of each step in Nike\u2019s value chain.<\/p>\n

Figure 1 [9]<\/p>\n

\"nike-figure-1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This figure highlights where in the value chain Nike has decided to focus its climate change efforts:<\/p>\n