Monday Motivation….. Jan 12, 2026 (781)

Monday Motivation….. Jan 12, 2026 (781)
Before Nike became a global empire…before the swoosh was iconic…before billions of dollars in revenue…
Nike almost died in a single night.
Back in the early days, Phil Knight and his small team did not have fancy headquarters. They did not have giant warehouses. They stored most of their shoes in a modest facility that was cheap, cramped, and barely holding their growing inventory.
One night, disaster struck. A fire tore through the building. Smoke, flames, destruction.
By morning, nearly all of Nike’s inventory was gone.
Everything they had worked for. Everything they had saved. Everything they had planned to sell. Gone.
For most businesses, that would have been the end.
But not for Phil Knight.
Instead of giving up, he made a decision that changed the future of Nike:
He grabbed the shoes that survived, loaded them into the back of his car… and hit the road.
He drove from track meet to track meet, pulling athletes and coaches aside, pitching them shoes right out of his trunk. Face to face. Hand to hand. Sale by sale. He built the brand the hard way. The raw way. The way most people avoid.
And something amazing happened: Athletes loved the shoes. Word spread. Sales grew.
Nike did not die in the fire. Nike was reborn in it.

Moral:
And here is the principle: When your plan burns down, your brand is built up.
Disasters expose two kinds of people: Those who wait for permission… and those who sell shoes out of their trunk.
Phil Knight did not let the fire define Nike. He let the response define it. And that response became the mindset behind one of the most iconic companies in history.
Have a great week ahead…!