Athletic endorsement in the Olympics

“No competitor who participates in the Olympic Games may allow his person, name, picture or sports performance to be used for advertising purposes during the Olympic Games". 

This quote comes direct from the Olympic Charter of 2007, Rule 45. It clearly states how sportsmen competing within the Olympic cannot be used at the same time in company advertising.

Many may have seen numerous televised adverts using athletes within them for promotional purposes. The Visa Advert with different athletes training and using their Visa card to save time. As well as the current Virgin Media advert with Usain Bolt imitating Richard Branson.

Now what many will read this charter as saying that the use of Olympic competitors within advertising must end on the day of the official opening Olympic ceremony. Therefore no advertising will be occurring as quote “during the Olympic Games”. It will be interesting to see if come July 5^th this is the case and many of these adverts who had cashed in on known sporting stars will have been changed to comply with charter rules.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpNtntHVrkc

“During the Olympic Games, virtually all the athletes carry a huge number of advertisements on their clothes. Numerous outfit companies such as Nike, Adidas or Oakley provide sportsmen with new equipment and clothes designed to facilitate movement and improve performance and at the same time advertise their new products to millions of viewers. Athletes can have various kinds of deals, while some are paid for appearance in a definite outfit, others just get them at no cost. Generally, skis, snowboards, skates and other equipment needed for Olympic games is considerably expensive, and the only opportunity for many athletes is to get sponsored by a sports-outfit company to cover the cost of their equipment. The companies greatly benefit from such deals since by this way their equipment is advertised by the world's most famous sportsmen. Often the companies modify the models of their outfit used by sportsmen to decrease their price and adapt them to the condition of consumers."

This quote found on the website for The Sports Journal, further supports our investigation within our feature article.

Top international companies are figuratively bribing athletes with free merchandise as a way of advertising. It is appreciated that clothing and equipment within certain sports can be very expensive. However, these companies are cashing in on an athletes talent and vulnerability and passion for hat specific sport. It leaves the athlete with no choice, either take the free merchandise or you cant afford to compete.

It seems a shame, but the Olympic Games just feels like one massive promotional stunt by multi national corporations. You don’t really see many small unknown sponsors at the games as the contracts are too expensive. So all you see when watching any event is a stadium bill boarded with four or five big well known companies constantly prying for your custom.

If the Olympic Charter states that:

“No competitor can be used for advertising purposes during the Olympic Games”, 

then why can they be seen competing with obvious branding on their shorts, tops and equipment? Surely that is advertising during the games?

It can be appreciated that without these massive sponsorship deals the Olympic Games would never be able to afford itself, which would obviously be a shame as they are a uniting presence for the whole world to share in. However, more must be done to stop letting the elitist companies be the majority sponsors within the games. 

What do sponsors bring to The Games

In this tough market any sponsor of the 2012 Games have to do things to really stand out, to really get their name across and increase revenue in terms of customers and business.  It takes a lot of thinking and hard work for the employees of these big brands to think of that special something that will make them stand out. I have been looking at some of the biggest names in the sponsorship line up for 2012 and finding what they have come up with.


P&G

P&G, owners of Covergirl, Gillette and many more are one of this year’s proud sponsors of the Olympic Games. The company have come up with a scheme called “Proud Sponsors of Moms”. The Ohio based company will be paying for the mothers of the Canadian athletes to join them in London.  P&G have committed themselves to provide $500,000 to the families of the athletes so that they can feel complete whilst representing their country.  


The company want to be seen as being socially responsible; this ploy to connect with their audience will reach them on an emotional level. The consumer will see P&G as a company who are really trying to help others and its almost too good to fault them, especially when it comes to mums!

You may wonder why target mothers? Well as major manufacturers of consumer goods, P&G see mothers as the target audience when it comes to buying a lot of their goods. As part of this campaign, the official P&G website has also adopted a system where anyone can upload pictures and videos thanking their mums or simply sending them messages. As a result this will encourage people to visit the website and is a great way of advertising.

https://www.pgproudsponsorofmums.co.uk

Coca-Cola
Coca Cola have said that they are committed to ensure the 2012 Olympic Games are sustainable and environmentally friendly.  One of their ways of doing this is by placing 260 brand new Coca Cola branded recycling bins all around the city centre of Westminster. It has been said that 11,000 tonnes of waste is produced in London every day, this is Coca Colas way of trying to make sure its dealt with in the right way. As one of the Games longest serving sponsors, Coca Cola plan to keep this recycling system going before, during and after the Games.

One of Coca Colas main goals throughout the 2012 Olympics is to motivate young people to get more in touch with the Games. As part of their pledge to make a difference in the UK, the Worldwide Partners want to encourage teens to live healthy lifestyles, be active and try out different sports. What better way to connect with today’s youth than through music.


 Coca Cola have teamed up with one of the U.K’s greatest talents at the moment, Katy B and Grammy award winning producer Mark Ronson.  Together they have become part of the “Move the Beat” campaign, in hope to bring together peoples love of sport with their love for music.  The campaign is split up into four parts:

·         The official Coca-Cola song for London 2012

·         Documentary- Following Mark Ronson travelling across four continents to meet five Olympic athletes

·         Facebook app “Track the Beat”- Allows young people all around the world to keep up to date with the campaign, see snippets of Mark Ronsons travels and share with friends.

·         Coca Cola Olympic Games Pavilion- A building which can be found in the Olympic Park that allows visitors to listen to the official Coca Cola song and make beats of their own

Coca Cola are also hosting another campaign called “Future Flames” which allow inspiring young people to carry the Olympic Flame in the London 2012 Olympic Torch Relay. In a bid to get the teens of London more connected with the Olympics, Coca Cola are providing sporting opportunities to young people in disadvantaged areas. They are teaming up with national charity “StreetGames” to give teens work experience with themselves at the 2012 Olympic Games.

http://www.thecoca-colacompany.com/heritage/olympicgames.html

McDonalds

McDonalds are also focusing a lot of their attention on today’s youth. They are trying to encourage healthy eating and a balanced diet. For the first time they will be serving Happy Meals in The Olympic Park.


McDonalds Champion of Play is a programme that is running throughout The Games which will be bringing children from all around the world to be a part of this unique experience. The programmes website will have features by famous athletes encouraging them to take part in sport and be healthy. The Happy Meals will include fruit, yoghurt and sporty fun books.

Being the Official Restaurant of the 2012 Games, McDonalds will be serving food to athletes, trainers, staff, volunteers and spectators.

http://www.olympic.org/sponsor-mcdonalds


For a full list of sponsors and info check out http://www.london2012.com/about-us/the-people-delivering-the-games/london-2012-olympic-games-partners.php

Major sporting sponsors involved in abuse scandal

http://www.knowmore.org/wiki/index.php?title=Nike

Workers in factorys that produce prodcuts for Nike, Adidas and Puma are being abused by their employers. A recent investigation showed the real conditions the factorys workers are surrounded by.

For a while now PlayFair, an organisation who constantly monitor and fight for the rights of factory workers, have been publishing reports and storys on how the workers are getting mistreated. Amoungst many of the major issues surrounding these work places are; poor pay, long hours and violence. 

 In a recent story published by The Guardian, we are told that factory workers from some of the top sponsors of the Olympics are getting sexually harassed and beaten.  It is claimed that some Adidas workers were paid as little as 9p an hour.

In these major companies the bosses have to make sure their working conditions are up to standard and meet certain legislations. The work done to produce these final garments and products aren’t always done in one factory, there are often stages in the production line. Not many companies will release the names of the suppliers used during this process but this year Adidas have.  Elasteks, a Turkish company who until recently supplied Adidas factory with material for their socks, has recently been dropped by the sporting giants. This is because sometime last year the workers from Elasteks attempted to set up a union against the working conditions of the factory and demand better ones. The demonstration resulted in the factory owner sacking the employee’s involved and moving his factory 280 miles away.

So basically, there are a chain of suppliers Adidas would have released the suppliers names to a certain level. So a company like Elasteks may not have been named, but the company they supply to, Gelal, will have been named. So obviously Gelal would have had to drop any connection to Elasteks so that Adidas would not suffer. When Gelal were checked out for working conditions they passed the test, but a source from inside revealed that the company were still using the remainder of their stock from Elasteks.

According to a report written by a charity called War on Want, this is a summary of who these leading sports brands are employing and what they hope to do through the sponsorship of the 2012 Olympic Games.

http://bit.ly/24CRt

Adidas has spent £100 million on the Olympics, securing its place as the only official sportswear partner of London 2012. In return for its financial commitment; Adidas will clothe the 70,000 volunteers who help run the Games and has the sole rights to produce goods with the Olympic logo. Adidas hopes to achieve over £100 million in sales from its Olympic clothing lines alone. More importantly; it hopes to use the boost to its brand from the Olympics to overtake Nike as the UK’s sportswear market leader – increasing sales across all of its product lines.


 In addition to the partnership with the Games, Adidas is also the official sponsor of Team GB and a range of high profile British athletes including David Beckham, expected to play in the British football team, the 2009 world champion heptathlete Jessica Ennis, tennis player Andy Murray and the current women’s 400 metre Olympic gold medal holder Christine Ohuruogu. Adidas has more than 775,000 workers in 1,200 factories across 65 countries making its products. Almost all of these jobs are outsourced, yet through its code of conduct and its relationships with its suppliers the company has enormous influence over their working conditions, and ultimately their lives.

http://bit.ly/zJTeoS

Nike is the world’s largest sportswear brand, holding nearly a third of the global market for athletic footwear, with global sales in 2010/11 totalling over £13 billion, earning the company over £1.3 billion in profit. It secured its association with the Games through the official sponsorship of a range of high profile teams including the USA and athletes such as Mark Cavendish and Paula Radcliffe.

This sponsorship aims to ensure the Nike ‘swoosh’ logo remains instantly recognisable throughout the world. Through its supply chains Nike influences the conditions of more than 800,000 employees in 700 factories across 45 countries.

Puma’s largest profile sponsorship deal is its relationship with Usain Bolt, arguably the
highest profile athlete taking part in the 2012 Games as he defends his Olympic 100 metre and 200 metre titles. Puma’s manufacturing is outsourced to over 350 factories, a majority of which are in developing economies, involving around 300,000 workers.

After being presented with the report written by War on Want, a Puma representative said that they had found evidence of illegal overtime in one of its supplier factories named in the report and will be investigating further. Adidas also released a statement that they were shocked at the allegations made and would look further into the claims. They said they were “deeply concerned about reports of harassment or physical abuse of workers” and they were going to be investigating straight away.

http://www.knowmore.org/wiki/index.php?title=Nike

So is it right that sponsorship is going to companies that are allegedly paying their workers as little as 72p a day? Although these major companies are also doing a lot of positive things for the Olympics is it still right? It again makes us question whether sponsorship does just go to the highest bidders.

Read more on the article written by The Guardian in regards to this scandal:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/mar/03/olympic-brands-abuse-scandal
 http://www.waronwant.org/attachments/Race%20to%20the%20Bottom.pdf
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/workers-supplying-olympic-sponsor-have-union-crushed-2375536.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factory_Act

Olympics 2012 - investigation and information about sponsors.

Different websites and different sources are giving out a variety of information regarding the Olympics depending on their PR, political or even personal stand point. To do a thorough investigation of Olympic sponsors it's important to decipher all this information, breakdown the PR jargon and get to the relevant information. As Stefan Fichtel said at data-driven journalism:

"A process is needed where the data is first understood and then visualised in a way that makes the connections visible at first sight"

When conducting an investigation on this scale it's important for you to gather as much data as possible from a wide variety of sources to develop a wider perspective. Begin with developing a main area of investigation - in this case Olympic sponsors - are research for data in relevant sub-categories such as 'information about...' and 'websites'. 


When this is established it's then important to filter down the information so it relates to your investigation. To do this it is important to keep your research and investigation in mind and to not get distracted by irrelevant information and to focus on finding what you need. A good tip for this is generating word clouds or searching for specific words within a text or a website. Additionally making your Google searches very focused helps eliminate unhelpful sources and helps your investigation. 


Finally it is then important to visualise this information and there are several ways to do this ranging from creating a spreadsheet or generating a range of charts through websites such as Gliffy makes the information easier to digest and also easier to present to people who are looking at your blog or during a presentation.


We are currently working to fill in this spreadsheet to benefit all individuals researching Olympic sponsors, so if you have any additional information you think you could add to this spreadsheet feel free to contact us via our Twitter page.

Adidas Olympic background info and history

At first glance, Adidas don't seem to have a lot of history with the Olympics. Even on the London 2012 partners page of the website, they are only listed as a 'London 2012 Official Partner' rather than a 'Worldwide Partner', but that would be a wrong assumption. 

Adidas have slowly become more prominent at the Olympics, and it started to become a major partner at Beijing 2008. This has grown more and more until, for the 2012 Olympics, it was revealed that Adidas have actually invested in training facilities in the five London Olympic boroughs. 

So Adidas have been doing rather well at contributing to the London 2012 legacy and being part of the Olympic family, but what's in it for them?

Well, from a branding point of view, the 'eyes of the world' will definitely be a good start, as will their association with Team GB and athletic success throughout Olympic history in general, as this Adidas heritage page points out well.

It seems that, given the attention Adidas will receive as an Olympic partner, they are hoping to harness it to become the 'biggest sportswear company in the UK'. They are currently in second, place behind only Nike. 

So, Adidas's investments and partnerships aren't entirely about creating goodwill. Although no-one  can condemn the fact that Adidas's facilities will be free to use to the public after the games, there can't be any doubt that it is just a part of Adidas's plan to try and make the UK an even more lucrative marketplace for themselves.

BP branding becomes graffiti target

Showing that, even in times of protest, the Brits are capable of displaying a sense of humour and wit, billboards depicting BP's slogan, 'fueling the future', have been changed to "f***ing the future", as it was revealed that, all across London, BP's signage has become the victim of graffiti. Presumably the irony of the 'artists' f***ing up a sign on the way to creating that message wasn't lost on them, although it has become the basis for a website of the same name, but the response by the community at large has been staggeringly predictable.

Regardless, the stunt has done an impressive job of creating awareness about BP's sponsorship deal with the games, with activists stating their aims as being: "[To] escalate public debate of BP’s sponsorship after headlines in recent months had focused on the Dow controversy."

There have also been various Tweets promoting the news, with standout links coming from here and here, to give an example of just two.


While it is probably to be expected that the news would be greeted positively by protest and action groups alike, and that it would be seen as good that people are apparently showing up the fact that money is triumphing above 'true' ethics, there is a serious point to be raised about how these messages influence the public.


These protests are meant to show up BP's supposedly indecent actions, but when these messages become carried, celebrated and promoted by people with Twitter accounts called Agentur Radio Utopie or the London Anarchists, for example, there is a danger of the debate becoming poisoned.


Why? Well, Twitter may hold the answer to that question. The Agentur Radio Utopie account has just 470 followers, and isn't even based in Britain, it's based in Berlin. The London Anarchists account is marginally more popular, being followed by 1,406 people. So, there's a worst case scenario of 1,876 people who want to be associated with terms like 'anarchists' and 'utopia'.


What's the problem with that? Anarchy and utopia are terms that are more often than not seen as extreme and divisive, due to the movements they are associated with. They are terms that the majority more than likely won't back. Take the London Anarchists for example. Nearly 8 million people live in London, and 1,406 people follow their Twitter page. Even assuming that all of them live in London, there's 7,798,594 people unaccounted for there, or they represent 0.01803% of London's population, whichever you prefer. A minority? You bet, resoundingly.


The very fact that they are such an invisible minority will not help their cause, and it's the exact same reason why their backing of such a campaign will do them no favours. Our entire society is based on the idea of majority rule, from General elections to strike action to deciding what sport is played in a PE lesson. Will 7.8 million people see the point of a campaign backed by 1,406 people. No, because the maths just doesn't add up.

Olympics & Dow Chemical

Dow Chemical, which is the world’s second largest chemical manufacturer, signed an agreement with the International Olympics Committee in 2010 to become an official World-Wide Partner for London 2012 Olympics. Dow has paid £7m for the 900m London Olympics stadium wrap.

Dow has links to the firm behind the deadly Bhopal gas disaster in 1984. The gas leak was one of the world's worst industrial disasters. Campaigners say the gas leak killed some 25,000 people.

BP Sponsorship Fallout

A glance at the comments accompanied by The Guardian's article retweets suggest that some people in the Twittersphere think they know why the company is playing a major role in the Olympics, with the above comment in particular mentioning a line amounting to 'money being unable to buy everything'.


He's right of course, it can't. But BP made $25.70 billion in 2011. If BP have agreed to sponsor the Olympics to the tune of even 1% of that, which is unlikely, then all of a sudden, from a business perspective, with events to organise and costs to pay, the deal looks incredibly attractive, especially in a capitalist world where budgets have to be met and profits will always be the number one priority.


When the Games begin, and millions are watching from around the world, and the British flag is being waved in anticipation of medal success, the cheers will be for putting on a Games that will make Britons proud. Those cheers won't suddenly turn to jeers come the closing ceremony, because we won't suddenly start thinking about the gulf of Mexico again, or even BP...


It's true to say that BP has attracted a fair bit of negative attention, and in truth, the ethical and financial whirlwind that is Olympic sponsorship can't truthfully claim to be squeaky clean either.


For the latest evidence of that, some might say unnecessarily, bold claim, you only need to go back 3 days to the above article.


The 34 signatories featured in the letter mentioned in the article above all, some would say rightly, take exception to the fact that the company formerly known as British Petroleum is officially listed as the major 'environmental' Partner for the Games.


The question on everyone's lips is a simple one... How on Earth can a company that was named as the 'responsible party' by the US Government who, just 22 months ago, filled the sea with an estimated 300 million barrels of oil, be suitable for an Olympic environmental sponsorship/partnership?


It's an uncomfortable one for BP, sure, but given the millions of people who will be watching the Games in the summer, it is an understandable deal from their viewpoint.


But for the IOC and the London organising committee, the 'understandable' section of that above statement can be removed, and they are just left with 'uncomfortable'.

Socialympics: the power behind the name

An event called Socialympics happening in London this morning has already caused a wave of new responses regarding the importance of social media within Olympic Games. The main speakers in today's panel consist of a former Olympic athlete Chris Tomlinson, Gordon Lott the head of sponsorship at the official London 2012 partner LLoyds TSB, Chief sports reporter of the Daily Telegraph Paul Kelso, Hugh Chambers the Chief Commercial Officer of the British Olympic Associated and finally Alex Miller CEO of Engine’s social agency Jam. 

We are interested in firstly, the influences of each of the panellists in terms of their relationship with the IOC and LOCOG and 2) what authority do they have to speak about the use of social media in this particular way?

It seems apparent that they all have a certain invested relationships in the contribution and overall success of the outlook of the 2012 games. All involved are making themselves experts on the Olympics, which they clearly are from the nature of their job titles, but what does this say about the audiences and the alternative messages of the games. For example, Carsten Thode (@SynergyCarsten) the director of consulting at Synergy, who are highly influential in the Olympic Games marketing, suggested that in the Athens Olympics in 2004, there was no use of social media during this time – despite web 2.0 being on the rise during this time.

From tracking the tag ‘socialympics’ on Twitter using @mhawksey‘s archive spreadsheet and it’s becoming more apparent that their invested interest is the only reason they’re pushing the Socialympics and generating hype on Twitter. Each individual represents a brand or a PR company who will positively benefit from the games so should we really listen to these representatives or are simply telling us what they want to tell us.

What do you think? Have you been involved in the hash tag frenzy? Tweet us @olympicsponsor or leave us a comment and we’ll get back to you.

Top Twitter contacts for the Olympics

This logo is not my own work. © 2012 Twitter

This is a list of useful Twitter contacts that can be used while investigating the Olympics.


General Olympics:
@gamesmonitor
@LO2012
@hannengland
@2012cushing
@Paralympic
@alexhuot
@DaveGordonBBC
@DCMS
@jacquelinmagnay
@ashlingoc
@Jeremy_Hunt
@mirrorolympics
@London2012Fest
@TimesLondon2012
@PressAssoc2012
@NickHopeBBC
@iocmedia
@UKA_athletics
@Lon2012don
@Telegraph2012
@BBCLdnOlympics
@SkyOlympicOrla
@youtholympics
@London2012HQ
@TeamGB
@sebcoe
@BBC2012
@London2012
@Olympics


Sponsor Accounts:
@UPS
@ThomasCookUK
@Deloitte (and @DeloitteUK)
@CiscoUKI
@ArcelorMittal
@AdeccoUSA
@AskLloydsTSB
@EDFofficiel
@BTLondon2012 (and @bt_uk)
@British_Airways
@BP_America (and @BPGlobalPR)
@BMWGroup
@adidasUK
@VisaEuropeNews
@SamsungMobile (and @samsunguk)
@pgthankyoumom (and @ProcterGamble)
@panasonic
@omegawatches
@McDonalds (and @McDonaldsCorp)
@generalelectric
@DowChemical
@Atos
@CocaCola
@CadburyUK

Dow Olympic sponsorship controversy

This logo is not my own work. Copyright © The Dow Chemical Company (1995-2012).

The Guardian recently ran with a story discussing Dow Chemical's controversial sponsorship of the Olympic Stadium. 

It raised an interesting question with regards to Olympic sponsorship. The controversy couldn't exactly be unexpected given the company's alleged 'liabilities' relating to the 1984 Bhopal disaster, but a very dangerous message has been sent out, possibly akin to "as long as they fulfil their £7 million part of the deal for the wrap that will go around the stadium, what's the problem?"

This isn't the only thing the company will be doing either, as it also has a $100 million sponsorship deal with the IOC itself.

All this comes in the context that the "(Olympic) Commission found that there was no coherent strategy to achieve a 20% reduction in carbon emissions". There could have been, but an initial plan to provide a wind turbine on the site proved 'impractical'.

This isn't the first time questions have been asked, and it won't be the last - but it is difficult to take given the previous boasts that London 2012 would be the 'greenest ever'.

Even a simple Twitter search for 'Olympic sponsorship' will guide you towards a collection of Tweets made during the Dispatches program covered in an earlier post, with the basic message of those being apathetic at best, and something similar to "it's no surprise that those sponsoring the games have access to tickets".

The Metro also recently reported about Olympic sponsorship, and carried quotes suggesting that "[The] 2012 Games has 55 sponsors, including Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and Visa".

There is an obvious elephant in the room here too. McDonald's? A fast food company, sponsors of the Olympics? I doubt somehow that the athletes looking at their advertising hoardings around the various venues while the games are on visit their restaurants too often. 

Clearly the partnership is important to both sides, and McDonalds do seem to acknowledge corporate social responsibility, with them training 70,000 volunteers.

But perhaps even better evidence of corporate social responsibility and a good PR opportunity would be to train the people who eat there more than they should!

Dispatches

image via Dispatches website

Tonight on dispatches on channel 4 there is a great documentary revealing the undercover story of London2012 Olympics. There have been many issues surrounding the ticket process of the summer Olympics in the UK. 9.3 billion pounds has been put towards the Olympics by taxpayers within britain and this was meant to be a games for the people. However, many top businesses and companies have managed to secure premium seating and tickets within this supposedly "fair" ballot. Many are now questioning the legitimacy of the london Olympic games. Sponsorship is part of this legitimacy issue, multi national corporations have secured million pound sponsorship and exclusivity deals. When in actual fact many of those companies have little to do with the Olympic message conveyed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). I plan to delve further into scandals surrounding deals made within the summer Olympics and aim to contact many companies about what message their sponsorship is conveying to the general public.