It would be no exaggeration to say that Sonny Vaccaro is responsible for perhaps the biggest partnership in sportswear history – Michael Jordan with Nike.
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Nike was a company battling for its life during Michael Jordan’s high school and college years. While we’d seen Larry Bird wear Nikes for Indiana State, they were not considered players in the basketball shoe industry.
That changed when Sonny Vaccaro convinced them to throw a financial windfall the way of the Bulls rookie. MJ was pretty much an unknown quantity even in 1984, after winning National Player of the Year honors.
It was his performance for Bobby Knight at the 1984 Olympics that first revealed his skill to the world. His performances prompted Peter Moore to coin the phrase ‘Air Jordan’ for the first time.
Michael Jordan, who favored Adidas shoes, threw a curveball as Sonny Vaccaro negotiated
The details of how Jordan eventually signed with Nike were revealed in his biography ‘The Life’, by Roland Lazenby. The author shed light on the important role played by Sonny Vaccaro in Phil Knight and co signing MJ.
Jordan was, till that point, known to favor Adidas, whose shoes he wore in training. He donned Converse sneakers during his 3 seasons with the Tar Heels. He also sported those kicks during his Olympics campaign.
However, his mother Deloris Jordan convinced him to take the meeting with the persistent Vaccaro and Nike at their Beaverton headquarters. Sonny had made his name by hosting the first national high school basketball tournament of note.
During the meeting, Jordan wanted to impose his will right from the start. He insisted that he wanted a car ‘right now’ as Vaccaro began talking about what Nike would be willing to offer him:
“It was the first time in my life I met Michael. We sat down and talked about him and Nike. He didn’t even know what Nike was. You have to believe me. I said to him, Michael, you don’t know me, but we are going to design a shoe just for you. No one had a shoe just for him, not yet.”
How his Nike partnership has made MJ a billionaire
Jordan’s first deal with Nike was worth $2.5 million for 5 years – much higher than the annual $100,000 offered to other top basketball stars like Magic Johnson, but still much lower than today’s deals. The deal also had a provision for a royalty paid to MJ for every shoe unit sold.
The Air Jordan 1s took the market by storm and sold over $130 million worth shoes in the first year alone. Nike took off in the sneaker market with this release, and has since consolidated its hold on a new market segment that continues to grow unaffected by economic downturns.
Michael Jordan reportedly earned over $256 million in the year of 2022 through Jordan Brand sales. His net worth of over $2.1 billion is built largely off the 5% royalties he earns from the brand.
