Coca-Cola dispatched vendors with backpacks during the 1996 Games in Coke's hometown: Atlanta. (Getty Images)Olympic Beverage since Amsterdam Games
The year of the Beijing Games marks 80 years in the partnership between the IOC and its most long-standing partner, Coca-Cola.
The Games continue to enhance brand value and boost sales, Petro Kacur, senior manager for marketing communications at Coke, tells Around the Rings.
"We are involved with the Olympic Movement because people around the world have told us that the Games are important to them. We know this through consumer research."
The same research shows enhanced sales from Olympic marketing campaigns, he adds.
Coca-Cola first joined the Games in 1928 In Amsterdam – the same year as several other Olympic firsts: women competing in athletics and gymnastics, gold medals won by Asian athletes, and the introduction of the Olympic flame to the modern Games.
The partnership began modestly, with a handful of Coke kiosks and bulletins tacked on Olympic venue entrances.
Just four years later, Coke started its first branded, Games-tied merchandising – a wheel-shaped indicator giving the world records in each Olympic event.
In the years since then, collectible Coke pins, bottles, posters and other items have added their own value to the partnership, says Kacur.
Activities such as pin trading or buying Coke in commemorative bottles create personal connections and reinforce preference for company brands, he says.
Coke stepped up merchandising since 1932, even appearing in Moscow during the 1980 boycott.
The company was also an inaugural member of the IOC top Olympic sponsorship program. The partnership –estimated to cost more than $40 million -- most recently was renewed in 2005 through 2020.
Coke plans no major campaign to mark the 80-year anniversary, but has provided ATR photos from the company archive depicting the evolution of the Olympic partnership. The Coca-Cola Olympic photo gallery is available here.
Sponsor Briefs…
Chinese state media Many Olympic sponsors have given cash, value-in-kind, or blood from company blood drives for earthquake relief. (Getty Images) say Olympic sponsors have made "plenty" of donations to earthquake relief efforts, and publish a list of donors. The foreign companies on Xinhua's donor list include 11 of the 12 IOC TOP sponsors (Kodak is absent) plus several major Games sponsors such as BHP Billiton, Adidas and Volkswagen. The list appears to be part of an effort to quash anti-foreign corporation rhetoric that popped up in Chinese websites and text message chatter after the Sichuan earthquake. Some Chinese attached the moniker "iron rooster" to foreign companies, accusing them of contributing nothing to earthquake relief. Chinese state media editorials have previously called on citizens to refrain from trying to rank donations. Many companies, for their part, offer press releases and statements announcing their relief efforts.
Italy-based tire maker Pirelli South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius says he will try to qualify for the 2012 Olympics if he does not make the 2008 team. (Getty Images)announces a new partnership with sprinter Oscar Pistorius. "For Pirelli, he could represent our new Carl Lewis; his story witnesses to the fact that will, passion and technology can vanquish any obstacles, improving the lives of many,” says Pirelli chairman Marco Tronchetti. Paralympic champion Pistorius, both of whose legs are amputated below the knee, is still working for an Olympic qualifying time, now that the Court of Arbitration for Sport declared him eligible to compete in able-bodied races. Olympic champion Carl Lewis was once a Pirelli spokesman.
U.S. television rights-holder NBC will produce high-definition broadcast, broadband packages and free-on-demand segments of the Games. The broadcaster has created a raft of marketing materials that cable and other telecom companies can use to promote NBC's services. NBC says demand for these services may entice consumers to upgrade their cable or mobile subscriptions ahead of the Games.
Coca-Cola names company veteran as general manager for the London 2012 Games. Daryl Jelinek has been with Coca-Cola Enterprises for the last 21 years in a variety of sales leadership roles, most recently as regional sales director for London and the South East.
As general manager, Jelinek is responsible for setting and leading the organization through the planning and execution of the Olympic Games, as well as building relationships with key stakeholders.
He assumes new duties July 1.
Media Watch…
The Olympic manager for TOP sponsor Omega talks to AFP about the difficulty of timing Games competition.
Media critic Lewis Lazare says TOP sponsor McDonald's returns to great storytelling with its new "Victory" advertising campaign. The ads feature a youth soccer team more pleased with happy meals than with a match trophy. Lazare predicts the wordless ad will go worldwide ahead of the Olympics.
Written by Maggie LeeFor general comments or questions, click hereClick here to see the latest Around the Rings Olympic Bid Power Index -- the only authoritative ranking of the 2016 bid cities.
Últimas Noticias
Sinner-Alcaraz, the duel that came to succeed the three phenomenons
Beyond the final result, Roland Garros left the feeling that the Italian and the Spaniard will shape the great duel that came to help us through the duel for the end of the Federer-Nadal-Djokovic era.
Table tennis: Brazil’s Bruna Costa Alexandre will be Olympic and Paralympic in Paris 2024
She is the third in her sport and the seventh athlete to achieve it in the same edition; in Santiago 2023 she was the first athlete with disabilities to compete at the Pan American level and won a medal.
Rugby 7s: the best player of 2023 would only play the medal match in Paris
Argentinian Rodrigo Isgró received a five-game suspension for an indiscipline in the circuit’s decisive clash that would exclude him until the final or the bronze match; the Federation will seek to make the appeal successful.
Rhonex Kipruto, owner of the world record for the 10000 meters on the road, was suspended for six years
The Kenyan received the maximum sanction for irregularities in his biological passport and the Court considered that he was part of a system of “deliberate and sophisticated doping” to improve his performance. He will lose his record and the bronze medal at the Doha World Cup.
Katie Ledecky spoke about doping Chinese swimmers: “It’s difficult to go to Paris knowing that we’re going to compete with some of these athletes”
The American, a seven-time Olympic champion, referred to the case of the 23 positive controls before the Tokyo Games that were announced a few weeks ago and shook the swimming world. “I think our faith in some of the systems is at an all-time low,” he said.
