Sometimes first impressions aren’t quite as accurate as some have grown to expect. Take the story of Phil Knight for example. He was teaching an accounting class at Portland State in 1971 to supplement his income at Blue Ribbon Sports Inc., a small athletic footwear company he had started. Short on resources, he offered a design student a few extra bucks if she would do a little design work for his company and help him with a logo. He mentioned that the logo should suggest “movement” and that was about all she was given to work with.

She did the work he requested and came back with an assortment of ideas, none of which really impressed him. Luckily time was not on the good professor’s side, however, as he had a bunch of shoeboxes that need to be printed immediately – once the logo design was completed.  As the clock ticked away, he went ahead and chose a design she had called “The Swoosh,” paying her $35 for her efforts and remarking that “ I don’t love it, but it will grow on me.”

How much did it grow on him? Well, it helped catapult his fledgling company, soon to be renamed “Nike” into one of the leaders of athletic sportswear, soaring past Adidas to become the top sold athletic shoe in the country – a position it has held ever since. Not a bad bargain for $35 and probably one of the worst first impressions in recorded history.