An athlete had an idea. Nike said no. On was born.

Athlete Founders, part one: On

I love a story that makes you wonder what else could exist if we listened more closely to the people living the experience.

Olivier Bernhard was an elite triathlete who wanted a running shoe to feel different. He knew the experience he was looking for because he had spent years putting his body through the demands of his sport. So he started experimenting. One early prototype had pieces of garden hose attached to its sole.

He took the idea to Nike, which sponsored him at the time. Nike passed. Bernhard carried on, and in 2010 he founded On with Caspar Coppetti and David Allemann.

There is a familiar way to tell that story: the big brand missed an opportunity, and the determined founder proved it wrong. Fair enough. But I think there is a more interesting question here.

What happens when we give the people closest to an experience the space to change it?

Bernhard understood something through using the product that could never have been found in a meeting room alone. That kind of knowledge exists everywhere. It belongs to the people living with a challenge, noticing what is missing, adapting what they have and imagining how things could work better.

In sport, athletes hold so much of that knowledge. They live with the products, spaces and systems built around performance. They understand their communities from the inside. Yet we are much more used to asking them to represent someone else’s idea than to help develop their own.

That is why On feels like such a powerful place to begin this Athlete Founders series.

What changes when the person with the insight gets to build?

Bernhard’s experience helped shape the product at the heart of On. Years later, the brand brought Roger Federer in as a co-owner, with a role in developing products, marketing and experiences. That relationship recognised something beyond Federer’s visibility: his ideas and perspective could help shape where the business went next.

Ownership is the part I keep coming back to.

Athletes create enormous value throughout sport. They give brands credibility, bring communities with them and help products connect with people. But the usual arrangement gives them a fee for their involvement while someone else continues to own what grows from it.

Imagine how different the opportunity becomes when someone who understands the experience can help make the solution, have a voice in its direction and share in its future.

That principle reaches far beyond elite sport. The best ideas often come from people who know a problem intimately. Their insight deserves a route into creation, with the right people and resources around it.

On is entering football. And ownership is entering the conversation.

On has just announced its entry into football with Kylian Mbappé, who is leaving a two-decade relationship with Nike to join the brand. He will work directly with On’s product teams to develop and test future football footwear and apparel. Thierry Henry has helped shape the move and is now On’s Director of Football.

But the detail that really caught my attention is this: Mbappé’s deal includes equity. He is coming in to help build this chapter of On and own a share of the business. The size of that stake has not been disclosed.

This is where the rented economy model starts to be challenged. Sport has become very good at paying athletes to lend their name, image and audience to something a brand owns. On is showing another possibility: involve the athlete in creating what comes next and give them a stake in the value they help build.

It is the same belief that sits at the heart of Squad Goals. An athlete’s insight, identity and cultural influence can be the foundation for something they help shape and own. Mbappé’s move shows that this conversation is reaching the biggest names in sport. We want those pathways to exist for athletes at every stage.

A brand creating culture with its community

On has also taken the insight that started its running shoes and built experiences around the people who run in them. On Squad Race brings crews together for competitions in cities across the world, turning local run culture into something people can join, travel for and share.

That intersection of sport, community and experience is exciting to us. We are seeing more people choose to travel around events they can participate in. They want the challenge, but they also want the people, the place and the story that come with it. On Squad Race speaks to that shift.

It also raises a bigger creative question: what happens if you start with the people inside a culture and build outward from what they know, need and care about?

The kind of studio we are building

I think about Bernhard walking into that meeting with a prototype. At that point, it was a rough idea shaped by lived experience. It needed somewhere to be tested, challenged and developed.

Squad Goals is building the studio where that idea would have been cherished.

We start by getting to know the person behind the performance: what they have lived, what they care about, the communities they understand and the ideas that keep coming back to them. We connect that identity and insight with people across culture, creativity and business who can help explore what those ideas could become.

That might be a product. It might be a fashion brand, a film, a digital platform, a community, a camp or a whole new sporting experience. We want athletes to have the space to find out, the support to make a start and a meaningful stake in what they create.

It is why this Athlete Founders series exists. I want to celebrate the athletes already building things, look at the cultural worlds growing around their work, and keep opening up the question of who gets to create and who gets to own in sport.

On began with someone who knew there was a better feeling to be found in a running shoe because he was the person running in it. What other ideas are sitting with people living an experience every day, waiting for someone to take them seriously?

If you are an athlete already creating, or you are curious about an idea you have not quite said out loud yet, get in touch with us at Squad Goals. I would love to hear it.