Olympic Sponsorship: Rule 40 and Ambush Marketing
We are continuing a series of blog posts where we use Newsdesk to research corporate sponsorship for the 2012 Olympic Games. Today we are looking at non-sponsors and how they also benefit from the games.
There is a growing backlash against the International Olympic Committee and their chosen corporate sponsors. The IOC has locked down the Olympic Village and the surrounding area in order to prevent unauthorized sponsors from getting publicity. Looking back to the Atlanta Games, you might see why:
The classic case of “ambush marketing” was in Atlanta, Georgia for the 1996 Summer Games. Nike plastered the city with billboards and handed out Nike flags for attendees to wave at the games. When all was said and done, many people thought Nike was the official sponsor, when in fact, it was Reebok.
We’ve already seen how the choice to exclude all credit cards except Visa backfired at Wembley Stadium, when the system went down and caused long lines and unhappy spectators. Now the story of the day is the ominous-sounding and 18 page long Rule 40, which does not allow Olympic athletes to appear in advertising during the Olympics. Writes BrandChannel:
Beats, the headphones brand of musician Dr. Dre, set up a special brand center inside the a [sic] private club and invited athletes to get a free pair. Soon, Beats products were showing up on TV on Olympians heads as they amped themselves up for competition. One British soccer team member even Tweeted “Loving my new GB Beats by Dre #TeamGB #Beats.” Well, the IOC wasn’t going to let that fly. The IOC immediately warned the British contingent to knock it off. If the athletes wanted to listen to music pre-game, the IOC noted that “Olympians were welcome to wear Panasonic headphones.”
Uniforms and equipment are not the only place logos and slogans are coming under scrutiny. German gymnast Marcel Nguyen has brought special sweat-proof makeup to apply to his chest to cover tattoos. US star runner and the “Brad Pitt of track,” Nick Symmonds, has been forced to run with tape on his shoulder covering a temporary tattoo advertising the Twitter handle of Hanson Dodge Creative, a Milwaukee ad agency with which he has a one-year sponsorship deal.
Nike is also turning their lack of Olympic sponsorship into a plus, portraying themselves on the side of the little guy. Take this commercial, for example, set in London, OH (home of the cheapest gas between Dayton and Columbus):
How is it possible to strike a balance between protecting the value of an Olympic sponsorship with respecting the individual athletes and their sponsors?
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