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One student refused to take no for an answer

When Omar Nuboer came from Suriname, on the northeast coast of South America, to study in the United States, he opted to major in accounting, a sound, traditional path likely to lead to a reliable career. But after working as a tax accountant for less than a year, he knew he had made a mistake.

“I just didn’t like it,” Nuboer said. “I have a creative side to me and I like to use that. Tax was just following the rules. That wasn’t for me.”

Nuboer returned to Suriname, where he launched a small business designing basketball gear for local teams. Nuboer had played basketball while in school. Using the website Alibaba, he connected with a supplier in China that would manufacture his designs. He sent designs, but because he had no experience, he struggled to communicate his ideas.
After spending about $3,000, he finally received a set of samples that he could show to teams.

Though he had purchase agreements from two teams, he realized he’d have difficulty building the business; he’d be

Omar Nuboer’s Instagram is filled with highlights from the program.
Photos by: Omar Nuboer / University of Oregon
better off starting as an employee than an entrepreneur. Nuboer knew that to do that, he had to move to the Portland area. Because he wasn’t a citizen, the only way to do it would be to go to graduate school.

He applied at the University of Oregon, where he was accepted into the accounting program for the 2015-16 academic year. Nuboer had no intention of going back to accounting but hoped living in the hub of the sports product world would allow him to make the connections to get his foot in the door.

Before Nuboer enrolled, he found the website for Oregon’s soon-to-launch sports product management program. He quickly applied and also signed up to attend a workshop at the school’s innovation lab.

Nuboer planned to vacation in New York City and then head to the workshop. While in New York, he received an email informing him that he’d been rejected by the sports product program.

Nuboer was crushed, but he decided that since he had saved up the $1,200 for the workshop, he’d attend it anyway.
When he saw Ellen Schmidt-Devlin, who launched Oregon’s sports product program, he told her he remained undeterred.

“I’m going to Eugene and I’ll be up here every week bugging you, trying to get a foot in the door” he said. “I’ll show everybody I’m really passionate about this.”

Schmidt-Devlin encouraged him to craft a letter explaining why the school should reconsider. He wrote it that night, working on it until 3 a.m. Three weeks later, he found out he was in.

Standing at a table in the program’s innovation lab earlier this summer, Nuboer fired up his laptop, opening a program that revealed mockups of a women’s jacket he and his classmates are designing. From a nearby bin, he pulled out an early prototype. A better version was en route to Thailand along with one of Nuboer’s classmates, who planned to have samples made at the factory where he was interning.

The group project is at the core of the sports product management program. Divided into teams of five, the students spend their 18 months researching, designing, creating and then launching a product that aims to innovate either the footwear, apparel or equipment segment of sports.

Nuboer is one of nine students on Team Pivott, the combination of two groups who are designing a jacket and shoe to meet the needs of a shared target consumer: fit, active women who value products that are versatile as they move between workouts, family and friends.

Other group projects include a jacket line for urban cyclists that would vary based on geographic preferences, a basketball shoe designed for outdoor play in China, and an outdoor shoe for women that is more fashion forward than the norm.

In their first year, the groups identified opportunities in their target markets, planned and designed their products, and created prototypes and technical specifications that are sent to manufacturers. They traveled to New York City for a tour of retail outlets and to Munich for ISPO, the international sporting goods trade show.

Before they return to class in September, they will travel to Hong Kong and Vietnam, where they will tour factories and deliver their specs to manufacturers that will produce samples in several sizes.

In year two, the groups will test their initial samples with consumers, order salesman samples to take to market, and launch the product at an event where they will engage potential buyers.

After spending much of their hands-on time in the innovation lab’s maker space in their first year, they will shift to a retail lab being developed as part of a new home the program will occupy across the street.

“If you want to do a running shoe, you need to see running specialty [stores] and understand where your shoe fits on the wall from a price point, from color and from how deep the retailer is trying to go,” said Lindsey Holts, a former Nike retail brand manager who is consulting for the sports product management program. “Until you show me how to bring it to market, it’s not a complete product process.”

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