UPDATE 1/7 at 9:00 am: See this story for the latest on Nike’s big sponsorship deal with PBOT.
The City of Portland says they’ll make an announcement tomorrow about a “major bike share partnership” with none other than Nike, Inc.
The sports equipment juggernaut is based in nearby Beaverton and has lots of ties to the Portland area.
We’ll have more on this story as soon as we can. Below is more in a statement from PBOT:
On Thursday, January 7, 2016, Commissioner Steve Novick will join Jorge Casimiro, Vice President of Global Community Impact for NIKE, Inc., and Leah Treat, Director of the Portland Bureau of Transportation, to announce a significant new partnership in support of Portland’s bike share system.
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PBOT is referring to this as a “major agreement” so it’s very likely it’ll be sponsorship of the bike share system. And from what we know about how these marketing partnerships work, the first announcement is the most valuable in terms of PR and brand exposure value. That makes it a solid bet that Nike will be the title sponsor. As we’ve previously reported, PBOT needs anywhere from $2 to $8 million in private sponsorship to create the system they envision.
Portland City Council unanimously passed PBOT’s bike share plans back in September. The system is supposed to be on the streets by July 2016 and a corporate sponsor is the final missing piece.
If this is a major sponsorship deal, we wonder if it will include some naming rights. Nike sure sounds a lot like bikey. NikeBikes perhaps?
The announcement will be made tomorrow morning at Nike’s Community Store on Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd in northeast Portland.
Stay tuned. We’ll have more details after tomorrow morning’s announcement.
— Jonathan Maus, (503) 706-8804 – jonathan@bikeportland.org