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≡ OLYMPIC SPONSORSHIP GROWS ≡
A change in the International Olympic Committee’s view of sponsorship rights was clearly signaled during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, with essentially a commercial for Paris 2024 Premier Partner LVMH incorporated into the opening ceremony telecast, and Samsung mobile phones magically available on victory platforms for the medal winners to use.
IOC Managing Director of IOC Television and Marketing, Anne-Sophie Voumard (SUI) told reporters in Paris:
“That is the direction we want to go into, we want to be unique in our actions. We don’t have any visibility on the field of play. We want to keep that position, but we want to work with our partners is that we can integrate their products in a way which is more organic in the Games. …
“So this is the path that we are taking deliberately and you will see things evolve during the next editions of the Games in this sector.”
On Thursday, the IOC and the LA28 organizers took the next step:
● “For the first time in the history of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, LA28 has created the opportunity to implement naming rights at competition venues.”
● “In celebration of this moment, LA28 welcomes Comcast Squash Center at Universal Studios and Honda Center as the first named venues for the LA28 Games.”
● LA28 Chair Casey Wasserman explained: “Today’s historic announcement delivers on that promise, creating the first-ever venue naming rights program in Olympic and Paralympic history while advancing LA28’s mission of a fully privately funded and no-new-build Games. These groundbreaking partnerships with Comcast and Honda, along with additional partners to come, will not only generate critical revenue for LA28 but will introduce a new commercial model to benefit the entire Movement. We’re grateful to the IOC for making this transformation possible.”
The program is limited, with “qualifying LA28 partners will have the opportunity to keep existing venue naming rights during Games time, as well as secure additional marketing assets to significantly bolster their activation efforts.”
Naming rights for 19 temporary venues will be available for sale to the IOC’s TOP sponsors and LA28 commercial partners. The existing venues covered by existing naming rights-holders also include the Peacock Theatre at L.A., site of weightlifting, and boxing finals (Peacock is a Comcast brand).
But, as Voumard emphasized last year, the ban on in-stadium signage will continue, as the announcement noted, “Outside of naming rights partners, standard clean venue Games policies will still apply.”
Observed: This is a logical and necessary forward step for the IOC and the first meaningful expansion of marketing rights for the LA28 organizers. It will be criticized by those who hate corporations and hate the Olympic Games, but should be cheered by Los Angeles-area politicians, who continue to be concerned that the City of Los Angeles and State of California will have to pick up an organizing committee deficit.
The LA28 folks and the IOC will have their hands full trying to sort out – on the fly – what works and what doesn’t in and around the temporary venue installations. But as companies look for immersive experiences to unlock new markets and remind existing customers they made the right choice, this kind of marketing programming is critical and timely.
How LA28 approaches sales of these new rights, through its joint-venture partnership with the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee, the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Properties (USOPP) unit, will determine its value.
In its infancy, this is not a billion-dollar addition to LA28 revenues, but if approached with dignity and imagination, it could help, not only with existing top-tier partners, but in upgrading existing relationships – how can Nike pass this up? – and creating new interest.
Logical, timely and potentially impactful, now and into the future. Lists of ideas are already being penciled out in Salt Lake City, host of the 2034 Olympic Winter Games.
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