Q1 FY27 is in the books, and leadership wants a gold star for a margin bump while the business keeps shrinking. Revenue down again. Digital, the channel this company bet the whole farm on, falling double digits. Nike’s own stores down too. And their guidance for the full year: sales falling high-single digits. That is the plan. Out loud. To investors.
What’s the answer from the top? Another branded “transformation.” Remember the cost realignment from March? Now there’s “Pace,” a shiny name for the same move: billions in “savings” through 2031, paid for with a billion dollars in charges that are mostly people. Two layoff rounds in one year and the slide deck still calls it momentum.
Nobody up there gets laid off for missing. The people who get cut are the ones who actually build the product: developers, tooling, designers, the folks who keep the factories and seasons on track. Meanwhile the stock is trading where it was over a decade ago and every quarter gets a new acronym instead of a new idea.
You don’t cost-cut your way back to being Nike. You win with product people want and a culture talent wants to stay in. Leadership has spent years torching both.
Stop renaming the problem. Fix it.