Adi Dassler

Adidas invented athlete endorsement with Jesse Owens in 1936

Adi and Rudy Dassler hustled their sports shoes onto non-German athletes at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, including Jesse Owens, who won four golds and beat the Germans in front of Hitler while wearing Adidas. Shaan calls it the first time an entrepreneur used sports to promote a brand, a strategy Nike later perfected.

“Jesse Owens goes on to win, I think, 4 gold medals at those Olympics. And so Jesse Owens is a Black guy who basically wins gold and beats the Germans in front of Hitler, who's promoting white supremacy at the time. And so it's a big deal for that victory at the time. And he's wearing Adidas. And this is kind of considered the first time that an entrepreneur used sports to promote their products or their businesses.”