Many sponsors are game for the Olympics

Michael Lang is president of Lang & Associates, a Toronto-based international event marketing agency with offices in Vancouver, Montreal and Atlanta.

Jennifer Scace is an associate with Lang & Associates, and co-ordinator for the Event Marketing column. Contributions, ideas, media releases and feedback should be directed to Jennifer at (416) 229-0060 or fax (416) 229-1210.

Despite the potentially high cost of participation, the Olympic Games remains one of the world’s most effective marketing properties.

The Olympic rings, one of the most widely recognized symbols in the world, reflect the excellence, quality and exclusivity of the sponsors with which they are associated.

Before securing an Olympic sponsorship, interested corporations must first understand the Olympic maze of ‘rights’ available, match those opportunities (‘rights’) against corporate objectives, and, subsequently, develop a plan to determine the corresponding costs.

Since the costs associated with the various ‘rights’ categories are tied to the restrictions placed on the logo, and size of the geographic area of exclusivity, only then can a corporation properly anticipate the costs associated with the implementation of a fully integrated Olympic involvement.

For example, top sponsorship (international), which allows a sponsor to use the five rings freely in association with the sponsor logo, along with the words ‘worldwide sponsor,’ can come with a price tag (for the rights only) as high as $50 million.

top sponsors for the 1994 Olympic Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway include Bausch & Lomb, Coca-Cola, ibm, Kodak, Panasonic, Time, Xerox and Visa.

Similarly, a national Olympic committee (noc) domestic sponsorship (i