JAY-Z’s “Greatness” Fuels New PUMA Campaign

Music mogul JAY-Z is doing much more than just lacing up with PUMA these days. The hip-hop icon is being credited with inspiring a new campaign by the sports apparel powerhouse.

JAY-Z’s “Greatness” Fuels New PUMA

According to reports, PUMA has created a campaign to stimulate and motivate excellence. Young Hov’s push for greatness is ultimately the battery on the new rollout’s back.

Ahead of what is shaping up to be a promising year for sports, Puma’s “Only See Great” campaign is hoping to rev up consumers for the 2021 season with a star-studded message reaffirming its commitment to excellence. Created in-house, the campaign takes its name from a quote from Puma’s creative director Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter: “I only see great. I don’t see good. I don’t see compromise. We should always strive to make something great, something that will last.” (Ad Week)

A PUMA rep has since come forward to provide more details on just how big of a motivational push Jigga has played on the “Only See Great” campaign.

“Jay-Z originally shared these personal thoughts on greatness in one of our very first discussions around product design,” Adam Petrick, Puma’s global director of brand and marketing, said in a statement. “His quote so perfectly represented the message that we as a brand wanted to convey in this unique year of sporting events and cultural moments, such as the Olympic Games in Tokyo. I think the message is about filtering out anything less than great, looking within and seeing something that no one else can see.” (Ad Week)

The goal of this campaign is to look and move forward despite the year this country has had. Puma plans to dive deeper into the stories of stars, such as LaMelo Ball, Usain Bolt, and Winnie Harlow. The conversation is started with these people is how their mindsets and views of the world have changed since the adversities from this past year.

JAY-Z Lands Creative Director Role

Young Hov has rocked with the iconic sports apparel brand for years. In June 2018, Jigga made headlines after securing a huge role as its creative director.

Puma’s global director of brand and marketing Adam Petrick confirmed Jay-Z’s title to ESPN’s Darren Rovell. Previously he had been called the president of basketball operations before Petrick clarified. The rapper and mogul will help Puma select players to join its basketball efforts and contribute to the brand’s overall direction as it returns to the basketball scene. (Bleacher Report)

Explaining Why It Takes Major Moves To Succeed

Hov knows he’s got to keep up the hard work to keep his empire going. During a recent interview, Hov spoke on all the major moves he continues to make with the South China Morning Post as his net worth also made a massive increase. JAY-Z is now worth over $1.4 billion.

In just several weeks, his net worth has risen over 40% following the sale of TIDAL to Square and his absurd $300 million champagne deal. The Blueprint boss also says he can’t just do music and needs to keep business moves going if he wants to keep raking in the dough and it’s paying off, so perhaps his advice is worth heeding. Hov also highlighted the importance of keeping the right crew around.

“I look at the make-up of individuals or a group and say, ‘Hey, wow, that’d be a cool group to hang out with” … It’s a certain decorum that they have, a certain way that they carry themselves and their business, [with] high integrity and passion for what they do. I just want to be surrounded by great people.” (JAY-Z to SCMP)

JAY-Z Sells TIDAL To Square

The rap mogul is no longer head honcho over at streaming giant TIDAL. He’s inked a major deal for some major money with a business partner/friend to part ways with complete ownership of TIDAL.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and his company Square (a digital payment service) has bought TIDAL for $297 million. While Hov no longer owns the streaming service, he’ll move to Square’s board of directors. TIDAL’s artist owners will continue to co-own the platform, as the second largest group of shareholders.

Upon his well-publicized acquisition of the service in 2015, from the Norwegian company Aspiro, JAY-Z brought aboard artist owners including Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Madonna, Lil Wayne, J. Cole, Coldplay’s Chris Martin, Arcade Fire’s Win Butler and Régine Chassagne, Rihanna, Jack White, Daft Punk, and others. Their stakes in the company—and their financial windfalls from the sale—were not made public. (Pitchfork)