NIKIN experienced two annual highlights this year: breaking the 2 million tree planting mark and the wedding of our co-founder Robin! The first is an incredible milestone in NIKIN's history, thanks to the entire community – together we're now moving towards 3 million trees. The second belongs in the #nikinlovestory category, as Robin and Jasmin first met through NIKIN. The beaming couple enjoyed the wedding in wonderful July weather together with NIKIN employees. Congratulations again, Robin and Jasmin!
Image: Met through NIKIN, celebrated the wedding with NIKIN!
This wasn't the only wedding NIKIN was present at, though: among the many beautiful submissions from our community, we found photos from various corners of the world and a customer who wore our NIKIN socks to the ceremony – wonderful! Speaking of NIKIN Around the World: Since this year, a NIKIN TreeBottle has been accompanying actor Brad Pitt on his motorcycle tours! He bought one of our popular reusable bottles during a wellness stay in the Alps.
But we also have some celebrities in our own ranks: Our Challenge League footballer, Michael, not only excels at supporting our business clients, but also regularly graces the NIKIN team with his corny jokes (if you're reading this, Michi, we're already waiting for the next one!). We've also spotted a new coaching talent as part of our new collaboration with the Ambrì Piotta Hockey Club: Coach Ivan!
Image: "The flat must fit into the square – or something like that..."
If my coaching career doesn't work out, we're still happy, of course. Ivan and the rest of the content team always inspire us with breathtaking photo and video material at our releases. And speaking of releases: this year was packed with new products! From the first Circular Shirt in collaboration with OceanSafe, to sleepwear, swimwear, and activewear, to the Texcircle Pullover, the result of a project by NIKIN and the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, and the first NIKIN Advent calendar, we ventured into new territory. Many of these releases were one-off promotions and therefore sold out quickly, just like the fleece products from our winter collection. These were gone within 3 days, but we've already reordered! Another highlight was the reissue of the very first NIKIN (then NIKIT) product, the TreeGym Bag, for our 7th anniversary. The product team, dressed in an 'unplanned' partner look on some days, did an incredible job on the 13 releases in total, chapeau!
Image: The TreeSweater Quarter Zip seems to be popular – especially with its design team.
To portray the products accurately and interestingly, certain props are sometimes necessary. For the studio photos of the winter collection, we were looking for a bench, which we finally found on Ricardo. The salesperson was delighted that the bench, once his parents' favorite after their deaths, became the star of the photoshoot. In addition to this stylish tree-green bench, our tree-like NIKIN models from the fall campaign and a "gondola" have recently been placed in the NIKIN office. Setting up the gondola was considerably more complicated than an IKEA frame (although these are often more complicated than the sketches suggest), but it made for a fun team event.
Image: The gondola under construction.
It's nothing new that the NIKIN team has a lot of fun together: Whether packing a few thousand goodie bags for our crowd investors, dressing up for the Halloween release of the winter collection (Robin, by the way, is hiding under the toilet paper mummy), writing Christmas cards together, or satisfying the subliminal mate addiction, laughter and jokes are constant companions – as was the case at the first workshop with our tree relationship coach, the 'Guru,' who was hired on April 1st.
Image: Humorous, scary and imaginative – the costumes at the Halloween release aperitif.
While we were taking you up with this Tree Relationship Coach on April 1st, we also organized other educational and fun events together in nature. We held two Tree Planting Days, where 60 participants planted a total of 800 trees, two CleanUp Days with a total of 70 people from the NIKIN community, and a forest workshop with 15 people braving the foul autumn weather. We were also present at the Openair St. Gallen and the Gurten Festival, as well as at three Christmas markets in Aarau, Bern, and Zurich. It was a huge pleasure to experience the NIKIN community's commitment so closely in 2023, and we look forward to future joint events – big things are planned for 2024, stay tuned!
We'd like to thank you, our amazing community, because without you, NIKIN and the 2 million (and counting) trees planted wouldn't exist! We wish you a wonderful, captivating, soul-soothing, fulfilling, and outdoor-enjoyable 2024—see you soon!
