What it is
The New York trip of December 2016 had called for deeper stories and fresher product. Two months later Khounlavong planned a second trip, this time in Los Angeles and with Nike's global product creation team.
He had worked Los Angeles before, as Nike's West territory sales representative for Nike Sportswear in 2010 and 2011. The trip ran from Monday February 27 to Thursday March 2, 2017. The itinerary carries his initials. Its first line after the flight reads "Jimmy to pick up team at airport."
What Khounlavong did
- Conceived and executed the trip. His fiscal 2017 review calls it a marketplace immersion trip with global product creation.
- Built the route by neighborhood, one district at a time: downtown on Monday, Melrose, Fairfax and La Brea on Tuesday, Beverly Hills, Venice and Santa Monica on Wednesday, Rodeo Drive and mid-city on Thursday.
- Set five meetings with retailers inside the route: lunches with Nice Kicks, Undefeated and Blends, and meetings with BAIT and Round Two Hollywood.
- Put run crews on the schedule at the hours they ran. The itinerary had the group meet Koreatown Run Club on Monday night at Wilshire and Oxford, and Electric Flight Crew on Wednesday evening.
- Scheduled consumer focus groups around them, including a focus group of female runners at Nike's West office in Culver City.
- Sent the group to stores that did not sell running shoes. The list included Supreme, Stussy, Union, Stone Island, Acne Studios and the luxury houses on Rodeo Drive, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
- Classed every stop by type in his planning sheet: Nike direct, boutique, city specialty, strategic account, inspiration and museum. He listed the city's running spots, Runyon Canyon, the Santa Monica stairs and Griffith Park.
- Opened each day after the first with a breakfast debrief.
Results
- Khounlavong's fiscal 2017 review records the trip as successful. No written recap of the trip is in the documents, so its learnings are not on record here.
- A logo marked KRC, the initials of Koreatown Run Club, appears a year later in the design review for the Nike By You Epic React run crews project. Khounlavong was by then Senior Merchandising Director for Nike By You.
At a glance
| Project type | Market travel and consumer insight |
|---|---|
| Industry | Athletic footwear |
| Seat | North America Footwear Merchandising Director, Men's Running |
| Ran through | Nike |
| Dates | February 27 to March 2, 2017 |
| Location | Los Angeles, California |
| Related pages | Jimmy Khounlavong, Nike Men's Running, North America: a $1B business in a contracting category, Market travel: one format, six cities |
| Principal | Jimmy Khounlavong |