Fixing the Swoosh: Luxury Heir Completes Nike’s New “Turnaround Trio”

Nike has named luxury fashion heir Alexandre Arnault to its board of directors as the company tries to win back Wall Street’s favor. 

Arnault, 34, is the son of LVMH Chief Executive Officer Bernard Arnault and currently serves as deputy chief executive officer of Moët Hennessy, the luxury giant’s wines and spirits division. He officially joined Nike’s board on Sept. 16. 

Introducing Arnault, who is known for previously injecting new life into Tiffany & Co. and Rimowa by modernizing marketing strategies and launching viral collaborations, Nike’s president and CEO Elliott Hill emphasized the scion’s expertise in helping some of the world’s most influential brands “stay relevant.”

The Frenchman is the third major addition Nike had announced in the span of a month, following the appointment of Pfizer’s Dave Denton as chief financial officer and the hiring of Jane Ewing from Walmart as chief commercial officer.

“I’ve been a fan of Nike for as long as I can remember,” wrote Arnault on LinkedIn, noting that the brand has been a part of his “countless kilometres, races and personal goals over the years.”

Arnault is joining Nike at a tense time. In September, following a high-profile ejection from the S&P 100 after 18 years and Bank of America downgrading the stock to “underperform” with a target price of $30, Nike’s shares plunged to their lowest level since early 2014.

Nike, which has lost over $200 billion in market value since its November 2021 peak, has been struggling with relevance for years due to a lack of innovation and losing ground to new running brands like Hoka and On.

The “Win Now” strategy introduced by Hill in 2024 to bring Nike back into retail stores and organize business around individual sports has not yet managed to revive the company, which is struggling with global sales and competition. Under Hill, the market decline only accelerated as the company shed roughly 60% of its market value over the past two years.

By tapping Denton, Ewing, and Arnault, Nike aims to address three of the investors’ key concerns: declining profit margins, broken retail network and a severe lack of consumer hype.

Yet the pressure on the athletic giant is mounting from every angle. In September, alongside the S&P 100 demotion, French soccer superstar Kylian Mbappe left Nike to sign with rival brand On, and a controversy erupted around an ad from Nike’s Converse shoe brand that some critics said evoked Ku Klux Klan imagery.

Nike reports its first-quarter earnings for fiscal 2027 on October 1. Wall Street expects $11.41 billion in revenue and earnings per share of $0.44.