Michael Jordan, Nike to open first Jordan Brand store in Chicago
The Jordan Brand is opening it's very first store exclusive Jordan gear store and it's going to be in Chicago.
By
Zach Harper
•
2 min read
30 years ago, Michael Jordan's first signature shoe was unveiled and made available to consumers as the first Air Jordan shoes. Since then, the brand has become a global icon and an incredibly successful brand developed by Michael Jordan and Nike. Each new style of Jordan shoes that comes out has become news and it's helped make the retro shoe market an enormous part of the industry.
Now, it's getting its own exclusive store that will be nothing but Jordan brand merchandise and is being placed in Chicago to tell the story of where it all began and just how far it has come. The idea is for the store to truly resonate with the city of Chicago and consumers from all over the globe and then expand out into other sites, much like the Nike Store chain has done.
Air Jordan I's hit retail stores in Chicago at $65 a pair in March 1985. Three decades later, Jordan, now a separate brand operating under the Nike umbrella, is coming back in a big way with a store that will open in the Windy City by year's end.
"I've been on these guys [at Nike] for some time, [saying] 'We need to do a Jordan Brand store, and we need to do it in Chicago first,'" Michael Jordan told ESPN.com.
In the past year, a partnership between Nike and Footaction yielded Flight 23 stores in New York, in Las Vegas and two in suburban Chicago. But the new downtown location, named after its address, 32 South State Street, is the first that won't be a co-branded location. It will be all Jordan.
The idea behind the store is not only to offer a wider selection of Jordan-branded product but also to tell the Jordan story and become part of the community. A space above the store can be used for Jordan-sponsored athletes or as a promotional space.
Jordan really did almost create this industry by himself because his stardom was so bright and bigger than life. Nike was obviously a huge part of the branding and creation of this signature line of apparel, but had Jordan not been the superstar he was on the court, the brand would never have lived off the court in the manner that it does. Today, you see the brand across sports other than basketball at all levels of competition.
ESPN.com says the Jordan brand is believed to contribute $2.5 billion in revenue this year, and that one of the clauses in his initial five-year, $2.5 million endorsement deal was to sell $4 million worth of shoes. He sold $70 million in shoes the first three months of the first Air Jordan's being out. That's a solid return on investment.
