I really really like Nike gear, but the company's a bit po-faced if you ask me.
Have you seen that they've got their legal bods leaning on John Smith's over the 'Just 'Ave It' line that appears in the Peter Kay ads? Infringement of intellectual property, copyright, blah blah blah. Whatever.
As for how much the Nike ad cost, I work as writer in the ad industry and I'd say you're looking at somewhere around 250 grand just to make it, and something like 250 grand to buy the airtime. So something like a cool half mil in total.
But if you think about it, the best ad for Nike is Niketown itself and also the Nike 10K. The marketing behind that is evil genius. 10,000 running adverts each spending something 50-100 quid each on Nike gear in the run up to the race.
Best ever running ad in my opinion is an Adidas press ad from a few years back. It was a shot of a street stretching off into the distance from a runner's point of view and read, 'Just to the lampost', 'Just to the parked car', 'Just to the tree', 'Just to the...'
It won heaps of awards.
Not glamourous ad, not a fashion ad, just true! Written by a runner for runners. (But not written by me, unfortunately!)
