Nike Co-Founder Phil Knight's Memoir Just Got a Release Date

A MUST COP.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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Sneakerheads are in for a treat come April, as Nike co-founder Phil Knight's memoir just got an official release date.

We first told you about the book, titled Shoe Doglast year, and now more details are finally surfacing. As previously mentioned, the memoir will focus on the brand's beginning stages and some of Knight's early business relationships.

Meanwhile, Sole Collector spotted a synopsis from the publisher, Simon & Schuster, that gives us an even better idea of what to expect when the book hits shelves on April 26 for $29. Check out the full summary and the cover below.

In this candid and riveting memoir, for the first time ever, Nike founder and CEO Phil Knight shares the inside story of the company’s early days as an intrepid start-up and its evolution into one of the world’s most iconic, game-changing, and profitable brands.

In 1962, fresh out of business school, Phil Knight borrowed $50 from his father and created a company with a simple mission: import high-quality, low-cost athletic shoes from Japan. Selling the shoes from the trunk of his lime green Plymouth Valiant, Knight grossed $8,000 his first year. Today, Nike’s annual sales top $30 billion. In an age of startups, Nike is the ne plus ultra of all startups, and the swoosh has become a revolutionary, globe-spanning icon, one of the most ubiquitous and recognizable symbols in the world today.

But Knight, the man behind the swoosh, has always remained a mystery. Now, for the first time, in a memoir that is candid, humble, gutsy, and wry, he tells his story, beginning with his crossroads moment. At 24, after backpacking around the world, he decided to take the unconventional path, to start his own business—a business that would be dynamic, different.

Knight details the many risks and daunting setbacks that stood between him and his dream—along with his early triumphs. Above all, he recalls the formative relationships with his first partners and employees, a ragtag group of misfits and seekers who became a tight-knit band of brothers. Together, harnessing the transcendent power of a shared mission, and a deep belief in the spirit of sport, they built a brand that changed everything.