Having won the MCCA ‘Best Campaign Featuring Sponsorship’ last year for its Team GB campaign around the Beijing Olympics, it’s great to be able to say that the Powerade 2009 InnerGear campaign has again been shortlisted in this year’s MCCA BEST Awards. Building on the insights and imagery of the Team GB campaign, Powerade brought the same InnerGear core creative idea to two of its international rugby assets – the English and Welsh rugby teams.

The 2009 edition featured England captain Steve Borthwick, Paul Sackey and IRB World Player of the Year, Shane Williams, in some equally impactful creative, and was supported through the line by Powerade’s cross agency team.

By Jonathan Izzard on January 20th, 2010

Tags: Beijing 2008, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Rugby, Sponsorship, Synergy, Team GB

No comments

Visitors to these pages will know that since questioning Andy Burnham’s now-infamous Medal Hopes announcement last year, I’ve written several posts on the issue’s evolution. So, with Team 2012 having risen last week like a phoenix from the ashes of Medal Hopes, it seems only appropriate to mark the issue’s apparent resolution with a few observations.

1. Team 2012 should not have been necessary

Let’s remember that the budget problem Team 2012 is designed to help solve was created by the Treasury in 2006. Let’s also remember that the problem was then exacerbated by two years of DCMS inaction, and finally exploded by the obvious flaws in Fast Track’s Medal Hopes ‘plan’ - memorably described by the BBC’s Matt Slater (author of a number of excellent blogs on the subject) as being ‘up there with Baldrick’s finest’. Quite a contrast with the Vancouver 2010 Own The Podium programme, launched in 2005 with adequate national and regional Government funding and a joined-up long-term plan.

2. The launch of Team 2012 is a triumph for LOCOG and UK Sport

Given the mess they inherited from DCMS and Fast Track, this is indisputable. Consider the list of their achievements: uniting the various stakeholders; creating a new property; resolving (apparently) the incendiary issue of elite Olympic athletes’ image rights; and persuading global Olympic sponsor Visa to come on board as Team 2012’s ‘Presenting Partner’ for £10m to start the fundraising.

3. Visa: sponsorship – or patronage?

I use the term ‘fundraising’ advisedly. Team 2012 is unashamedly a fundraising initiative designed to dent the shortfall in our Olympic sports’ budgets for London 2012, and increase Team GB’s chances of success: the official press release talks of nothing else. In which case, is Visa’s role more about patronage (financial aid with little or no expectation of ROI) rather than sponsorship (a win-win marketing partnership)? Don’t misunderstand me: I wish Team 2012 and Visa the best of British. But getting a meaningful return from this particular £10m investment looks like a big ask.

4. Sponsorship is not the only answer to the budget problem

A month after Andy Burnham’s original Medal Hopes announcement, I began advocating that any replacement programme should also incorporate innovative non-sponsorship fundraising models that had evolved elsewhere, such as Team Business West Midlands and the Vancouver 2010 Patron’s Programme. It’s good to see that this approach has been built into Team 2012, in the shape of the SME Club and the Official Donor programme.

By Tim Crow on October 7th, 2009

Tags: DCMS, Default, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Olympic sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Synergy, Team GB

No comments

Refreshing to see BOA Commercial Director Hugh Chambers, quoted in the Telegraph this morning, playing down expectations around the revenue-generating potential of Team 2012.

A smart move - much in contrast to Andy Burnham’s announcement of the Medal Hopes scheme which Team 2012 has replaced - as is Chambers’ advocacy of alternative, non-sponsorship based, funding models I’ve suggested previously, in particular a London 2012 version of Vancouver 2010’s Own The Podium programme which I wrote about back in February.

By Tim Crow on April 1st, 2009

Tags: BOA, Default, London 2012, Team GB, Vancouver 2010

No comments

The team behind Powerade’s InnerGear campaign is celebrating today after picking up the ’Best Communication Campaign featuring Sponsorship’ at the highly regarded MCCA Best Awards last night.

Entered by Synergy, Coca-Cola GB’s sponsorship consultancy, the campaign’s striking photography, of Team GB athletes doing their individual sports naked, caught the judges eyes.  The win is the second in a row for Synergy campaigns.  In 2008, Guinness, with its title sponsorship of the English Rugby Premiership, was the victor.

Fingers are now crossed for both the Hollis and Sport Industry Awards 2009 for which the Powerade InnerGear campaign has also been short-listed.

By Sara Wilson on March 6th, 2009

Tags: Beijing 2008, Default, Guinness Premiership, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Olympics, Rugby, Sponsorship consultancy, Synergy, Team GB

No comments

Last week we helped launch British Airways’ Great Britons campaign at Heathrow by naming a plane after Olympic Gold medallist Chris Hoy. We’ve been working closely with the team at British Airways to create a campaign to demonstrate a clear role for British Airways in the London 2012 Olympic Games.

As the national flag carrier, helping British talent succeed has always important to BA and the 2012 Games has given the airline a great goal to aim for. The BA Great Britons programme is offering hundreds of free flights in the run up to 2012, to enable budding talent from sport, fashion, community, art & design, innovation and performing arts to realise their dreams.

Whilst much Olympic marketing can feel remote to consumers, this campaign has active participation at is core. Alongside encouraging applicants to show how flights could help them, BA is encouraging the public to vote on who deserves to fly across the world in search of their dream.

The initial response has been positive with good media pick up and lots of discussion on a variety of blogs from http://www.gaj-it.com/7639/british-airways-holds-its-very-own-britains-got-talent-show to http://styleclone.com/128/fancy-a-flight-to-milan-fashion-show-with-british-airways. The hope is to not only receive hundreds of applicants but create a forum for discussion and support for Britain’s up and coming talent.

By Roberto Colandangelo on February 27th, 2009

Tags: Fashion, Film, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Music, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Team GB, The Arts, grass roots sport

1 comment

Given that the announcement by Andy Burnham of Team 2012, the replacement fundraising programme for the ill-conceived Medal Hopes, was very long on PR and positioning but very short on detail, I give Team 2012 only a cautious welcome.

On the plus side, it’s good to see the various stakeholders in London 2012 are working together - a rarity in British sport. And it would be extremely churlish not to applaud the motivation behind the scheme, which is to ensure that all our Olympic sports and athletes have the best possible chance of success at London 2012, including the eight Olympic sports that were hit hardest by the budget shortfall that Medal Hopes failed to plug.

I’m also encouraged that the announcement promises that Team 2012 will include alternative funding models I suggested last year - creating a non-ambush entry point for smaller businesses to 2012 using the Team Business West Midlands model, and sourcing private donations using the Vancouver 2010 Patrons Programme model - as an alternative to Medal Hopes.

But until the full details of the scheme are revealed, questions remain about the nature of the rights being sold, and the implications for London 2012’s global and domestic sponsors.

Perhaps the biggest question, however, is why it has taken DCMS so long to begin sorting out a job it was tasked with back in 2006 by the then-Chancellor Gordon Brown?

Contrast this with Vancouver 2010’s equivalent Own The Podium programme, launched in 2005 with adequate national and regional Government funding, on track in every respect, and currently completing the job with a clever and perfectly-timed fundraising appeal to the Canadian public, $20.10 for 2010.

By Tim Crow on February 27th, 2009

Tags: Default, London 2012 sponsorship, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Olympic sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Team GB, Vancouver 2010

No comments

Synergy has been shortlisted in the ‘Best Campaign featuring Sponsorship’ category at the MCCA Best Awards 2009, for Powerade’s sponsorship of Team GB and the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

The sponsorship, managed by Synergy on behalf of Powerade, was the focus of a fully-integrated campaign which was based around the concept of InnerGear - the brand’s core creative idea.  Synergy worked with Powerade and it’s other agencies to activate the campaign through-the-line, resulting in the brand enjoying it’s highest-ever levels of market share.

Winners will be announced at the MCCA Best Awards dinner which is being held at The Brewery on Chiswell Street on Thursday 5 March, so fingers crossed!

By Sara Wilson on January 19th, 2009

Tags: Beijing 2008, Brand marketing, Cycling, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Olympics, Synergy, Team GB

No comments

As further proof of the recession, the announcement by B&Q that it would not be extending its sponsorship of Team GB Olympic and Paralympic athletes and hopefuls generated more than its fair share of coverage. But only one commentator, Paul Kelso of the Telegraph, touched on what would have been the key driver in the DIY chain’s business case: to continue the association B&Q would have had to upgrade to a London 2012 sponsorship, involving significantly increased rights fees.

By Tim Crow on January 14th, 2009

Tags: Default, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Sponsorship, Team GB

No comments

It’s good to see that UK Sport and LOCOG are taking Medal Hopes over, and back to the drawing board.  As I wrote back in August when it first surfaced, Medal Hopes was clearly a flawed concept that needed a radical re-think.

I wasn’t alone. Peter King, CEO of British Cycling, was quoted by the Evening Standard as follows after listening to a Medal Hopes briefing by Culture Secretary Andy Burnham:   

“I don’t think it will work - it’s an absolute non-starter. Even if it does generate income it will not generate £79million. Athletes are supposed to give three days of their time (per year) to support the lottery programmes. But it will be an extra demand on their time and there will be conflicts of interest between athletes’ own sponsors, their governing bodies’ sponsors and the sponsors of the Medal Hopes scheme.”

The mystery is why it took DCMS and Fast Track over two years to come up with something that would be so obviously problematic and unpopular.

Now, with UK Sport leading, and LOCOG advising, the global and domestic sponsors of London 2012 will be reassured that whatever finally reaches the market will not dilute and ambush the Olympic sponsors’ territory in the way that Medal Hopes was clearly going to.

Indeed I hope that UK Sport will explore non-sponsorship solutions, and take inspiration from innovations which others have already created to fund the Olympics without ambushing it, such as Team Business West Midlands, BeNumber 1 and the Vancouver 2010 Patrons Programme. 

They could also look at why it is that our Olympic athletes’ contractual appearances for the National Lottery are, as The Times’ Olympic Correspondent Ashling O’Connor revealed recently, ‘rarely used’, and how they might be used to drive additional funding via the Lottery rather than being re-sold as part of Medal Hopes.

By Tim Crow on December 4th, 2008

Tags: Ambush campaign, DCMS, Default, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Sponsorship, Team GB

No comments

Listening to the unassuming Dave Brailsford, the man in charge of British Cycling, at this week’s FT Sport Industry Summit, was electrifying.

No wonder the cyclists won so many medals in Beijing.

He told his story quietly but with such underlying passion and determination that the effect was mesmerising.

It underlined the vital role played by excellent coaches and back-up teams and how badly our athletes need them if they are to continue to succeed at the elite level in general and the Olympics in particular.

I think it was the word ‘determination’ that came across so emphatically.  He and his team were utterly determined to succeed and the strategy they embraced to achieve that goal was cold, ruthless and deadly.  If you didn’t make the grade you were out.  No hard feelings, no bitterness; that was the deal.

We need more Dave Brailsfords in all walks of life.  But, in the meantime, let’s just hope we can replicate him in all the other Olympic and Paralympic sports because that certainly would lead to more success at London 2012.

By Karen Earl on November 7th, 2008

Tags: Beijing 2008, Cycling, London 2012, Olympics, Team GB

No comments