Ahead of the year’s biggest global sporting event, the 2022 FIFA Men’s World Cup, sportswear behemoth Nike launched .SWOOSH – a new Web3, blockchain-powered platform serving as a digital community and experience hub and a home for Nike’s virtual creations and products.
The hub was promoted through a PR and social-first campaign spearheaded by a hero ‘The Future Of Sport’ video which dropped across Nike channels on 29 November and which was both teased and supported by a set of social content pieces.
Nike stated that .SWOOSH will be “an inclusive, equitable place for athletes, creators, collectors and consumers to design and own the future of sport”.
Open to Nike members, the platform will offer opportunities for them to learn about and collect virtual creations – typically interactive digital objects like virtual shoes or NFT jerseys – which the brand believes consumers, fans and members will soon be able to wear in digital games and immersive experiences.
Plus, .SWOOSH community members will also be able to unlock access to physical product or events like intimate conversations with athletes or designers.
“We are shaping a marketplace of the future with an accessible platform for the web3-curious,” outlined Nike Virtual Studios General Manager Ron Faris. “In this new space, the .SWOOSH community and Nike can create, share, and benefit together.”
Nike’s objective is to ensure that the platform with a community “as diverse and equitable as possible” and the company will “prioritise local communities that it supports across its diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.”
The first collection will focus on the brand’s iconic Air Force 1.
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Despite the PR and social-first launch campaign, .SWOOSH currently remains in Beta and Nike state that registrations will open before the end of 2022. The US will be the first market to open, followed by select countries in Europe.
In early 2023, Nike is expected to unveil its first comprehensive digital collection – one inspired by .SWOOSH’s community. During this collection’s drop, Nike has also said that members will be able to enter a community challenge to win the opportunity to co-create virtual product with Nike and those winners will be able to earn royalties on the virtual product they help co-create.
By creating .SWOOSH, Nike claims it is “expanding the definition of sport by democratizing the web3 experience so that everyone can collect, create and own a piece of this new digital world.”
We will see.
From Puma’s ‘Black Station’ project, to ‘ASICS x Solana UI‘ plus ‘ASICS x STEPN‘ and from ‘Onlife‘, through Under Armour’s ‘Genesis Curry Flow Virtual NFT Sneakers‘ to Nike’s own ‘CryptoKicks‘, we’ve seen sportswear brands amongst the early category movers in the virtual product space. Perhaps this will be the answer to the question ‘what do you do with your sports virtual products and NFTs’ other than watch them decline in value?.
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