In a new run of short films released last week titled Breaking Through with Sport, Nike (耐克) is using the language of running and basketball to puncture a holiday-season pain point: social comparison. The campaign follows on from Nike’s Year of the Horse campaign and Unbridled product range, but shifts the focus from festive design to something closer to cultural coping mechanisms.
The first film is set at a family gathering in Shanghai, where aunties and uncles turn polite concern into an impromptu salary ranking – something largely unthinkable in the west, but not considered so intrusive in Chinese culture. Numbers climb from five to fifteen thousand as relatives size up each other’s children. Then Beibei, freshly back from a run, is asked the question everyone dread. Her answer, ‘200k,’ lands like a mic drop. It’s not a real pay cheque, but a runner’s count: 200k as in kilometres.
A second film plays out inside a basketball court where children compete over their parents’ job titles: HR, CFO, CEO. One kid ends the debate with a single line: ‘My dad is MVP.’ In Nike’s world, sports status beats corporate hierarchy.
The strategy is simple. Nike isn’t trying to capitalise on the festive period with heavy-handed horse symbolism. Instead, it is tapping into how young Chinese consumers are increasingly tired of being measured by external markers – income, titles, marriage timelines.
By swapping social identity for athletic identity, Nike offers a small psychological exit: if the room insists on ranking you, change the game. It’s a neat piece of brand logic. Running and basketball aren’t products for Nike to sell, they are avenues for young people to reframe pressure and reclaim control.
Breaking Through with Sport isn’t as much about Nike’s usual motivational message. Instead, it’s more of a social prompt. One that demonstrates to young people that sport offers a way out of – or at the very least, a way to humour – the competitive undertones that come with holiday seasons challenging family moments.
