Ambush Marketing in the Olympic Games

Running head: Ambush Marketing in The Olympic Games

Ambush Marketing In The Olympic Games

Taylor O’Neil, Claire Mirksy, Kaitlyn Turkett, Caroline Elyse

MKTG 38000 Fall 2014

Ithaca College

Ambush Marketing in the Olympic Games 2

Introduction Mega-‐sporting events such as the Olympics and World Cup evoke feelings of

happiness and enjoyment through friendly competition around the world. These feelings

are rare entities and difficult to recreate anywhere else. This leaves marketers in a frenzy,

fighting for sponsorships and advertising spots to gain positive association within these

mega-‐sports. Marketers have taken matters into their own hands and created a new

marketing strategy called ambush marketing. Ambush marketing is often referred to as

‘parasitic’ marketing because companies act as the mega-‐sport sponsors when they are

actually not. Brands such as Nike, for example will ambush market World Cup events if

their competitor, Adidas is an official sponsor just to stay competitive within the market.

Ambush marketing is growing significantly, especially within the sports world. It has

become so common that it is almost mandatory to ambush the official sponsor if that

company is their competitor. This is especially enticing with the incentive of not having to

pay to get the same publicity. Ambush marketing seems to constantly straddle the line of

legality and as a result, the practice has been deemed ethically questionable. The ambush

strategy affects a wide range of people and brings upon a number of complexities legally,

ethically and economically. As ambush marketing grows the dynamic between marketers

and the corporate event planners will change dramatically and cause issues for funding

sporting events in the future.

Types of Ambush Marketing Ambush marketing is when a company associates itself with specific events when

they are not the official sponsors. The ambushers avoid paying sponsorship fees and

disregard any permission or limitations that the event organization has enforced. Official

sponsors have the right to promote their brand throughout the game and gain the positive

association that the Games have to offer. Hence, the corporate sponsor is promoting and

spreading awareness on an international level. There is an important level of reciprocity

within this contract because the corporate sponsor’s money goes towards the current and


future events success. Advertising is a huge source of income and if event organizations

lose that money due to ambush marketing it could hinder the future success of said events.

There are two main types of ambush marketing; direct and indirect ambush

marketing. Direct ambush marketing is when marketers directly use the sporting events

logos, which legally up for discussion and further legal action. Indirect ambush marketing is

a little more conspicuous and uses loopholes to attain their marketing goals. Examples of

indirect ambush marketing would be to find advertisement placement on transportation

stations or in transit within the event’s city location. This pushes the brand and its positive

association with the Games without paying, which is obviously more appealing. Regardless

of whichever route marketers choose to take when executing their marketing strategy they

still have the same goal; “to attract attention to one’s products or services by taking

advantage of the ‘glow’ of a big event” (Vasallo 2009, 2).

Why use Ambush Marketing? From a brand perspective, many would question why corporations would want to

partake in activities that are unethical. This could potentially hurt the brand image if

consumers knew they were not abiding by the rules. In fact, amongst mega-‐sporting events

it is strongly looked down upon because the ambushing “activities of the company that

does not seek to directly and intentionally ambush a competitor, but instead merely seek to

capitalize on the goodwill, reputation and popularity of a particular sport or sporting

event” (Payne 1998, 324). The positive association that companies strives for by using

ambush marketing could backfire on them because of their poor ethical practices.

Companies desire for a wow factor during these events also takes away from the actual

events. Some consumers could say it adds to the atmosphere but when things are not

planned out correctly and cohesively there could be a greater consequence. There is never

a guarantee that a company’s ambush marketing strategy will be successful so in that split

second, a company/organization can make or break their brand within minutes.

So, why participate in a risky and questionably ethical situation on an international

platform? Consumers love sassy and risky brands that push the envelope. There is a sense

of thrill, innovation and creativity that comes along with questionable ethical actions and


people like to be apart of that. On the other end of the spectrum, consumers often cannot

even tell that these marketers are doing anything wrong. They could believe that they are

rightfully so a sponsor and reap all the benefits of the actual sponsor. This is honestly the

ultimate opportunity for companies that do not have a lot of money or are a well known

brand. They can increase their awareness in seconds and compete with top competitors

within their market, it is a truly powerful strategy. “If large-‐scale corporate sponsorship is

striking in terms of it persuasiveness and recency, the related phenomenon of ambush

marketing is even more so” (O’Sullivan 1998, 351). There is great incentive in using the

alternative strategy of ambush marketing, because the risk in fact, may be worth the gain.

Consumers’ Perspectives and Attitudes toward Ambush Marketing At the end of the day, the main concern is how the consumer perceives ambush

marketing and its actions associated with the actual event. The organization has no control

over the ambushers so they can act in a way that will not compliment their brand or

properly represent what they stand for. Ambushing is a “marketing tactic [that] is meant to

create confusion in the consumer’s mind and hence gain the benefits of being an Olympic

sponsor while weakening the competition’s position” (MacIntosh 2012, 1). The confusion is

easy to create unless the consumer understand the inside deals of the event on a deeper

level, which plays to ambushers benefit. It has been proven that “sponsorship has

positively influenced consumption; particularly if the association between sponsor and

sponsee is a good fit” (1). Marketers that understand their brand and can creatively

incorporate themselves into cohesive events can be a great opportunity to increase their

sales significantly.

The most important factor in this equation is indeed the consumer, so it is crucial to

understand their behavior. Another major factor to take into consideration when

establishing a marketing mix is the interest level of the consumer pertaining to the event

that the marketers plan on ambushing. As mentioned previously, the Olympics is one of the

biggest and positively associated events around the world. Wars have actually stopped to

peacefully participate in these Games, so that goes to show how much power that the

Olympic brand has over consumers. It has been “reported that 66% of respondent


indicated that Olympic sponsorship favourably affected their purchase habits” (2).

Consumer’s attitudes are clearly not changing knowing that the ambushers are going

around the regular laws. Therefore, there seems to be no clear disadvantage, right away at

least to the fact that they are continuing to practice ambush marketing in the eyes of

consumers.

Athletes and Participants’ Attitudes Towards Ambush Marketing Athletes are often targeted specifically in mega sports, especially if they are a highly

recognizable figure. For instance, Michael Johnson promoted Nike shoes and their products

in the 1996 Olympic to combat the official corporate sponsor, Reebok. This action derailed

the power of Reebok’s sponsorship and associated Nike closely with a personal

sponsorship of an Olympic athlete. Iconic figures that personally endorse brands regardless

of the event sponsorships are their own entity and extremely powerful. Unless the athlete

has entered into a specific contract they have the ability to take whatever promotional or

advertising offers they get. Therefore, ambush marketing plays to their advantage.

Participants in events that are not recognizable have a completely different attitude

towards ambush marketing. In such events as the ING New York City Marathon, the

runners are exposed to multiple organizations and corporation that are the official

sponsors. The participants that are returners have shown to have higher involvement with

the corporate sponsors especially if the sponsors are returners as well. (McKevey 2012, 9)

They feel a stronger connection and loyalty to these brands that are officially sponsoring

the marathon, so they look down upon the ambushers. The corporations that officially

sponsor the marathon seem to show a common interest and actually care about what the

event actually stands for, rather than the ambushers that are just feeding off the events

good will. Hence, participants have a negative outlook towards ambush marketing.

Organizations’ Attitudes Towards Ambush Marketing

The organization event coordinators actively try to stop ambush marketing from

taking place for a multitude of reasons. First, as previously mentioned, ambushers take


away from their paying sponsors that help them fund the event. Secondly, they do not have

control over the ambush marketing so it could potentially derail the plans they have in

store for the event. Organizations, especially the International Olympic Committee have

been working very hard to come up with contingency plans to prevent ambush marketing

from occurring. The crisis management strategies that event coordinators use “block the

various loopholes of the traditional ambush routes to build a fortress around their

marketing programs” (Payne 1998, 328). There are numerous tactics that can be used to

accomplish this. Most of the contingency plans are backed by legal values. For example,

they have multiple contracts that prohibit third party uses of logos, clearly defined

exclusivity rules and a greater control over the media programing being run around that

time. The legacy and importance of keeping legal sponsors are very important to these

events and coordinators will do whatever it takes to ensure their future success by

squashing as much ambush marketing as they can.

Positioning Ambush Marketing as a Legal Issue Ambush marketing most commonly takes place during Global Sporting Events with

participation from various countries or during events viewed by multiple countries.

Determining the legality of various ambushing marketing techniques practiced at such

events can be difficult because of the varying laws across countries. International

governing committees such as the International Olympic Committee can make this

difficulty easier. Ambush marketing is also handled by the legislation of the host countries

of major sporting events. In fact, many countries have passed specific legislation to protect

their venues from ambush marketing such as Great Britain, Canada, Australia, South Africa,

and the US. In addition to the specified legislation passed by various countries, there is

existing legislation that is effective in the fight against ambush marketing.

Limits of Intellectual Property Law

It is conveyed that lawsuits suggesting infringement are only effective against

“primitive ambushers” (Marmayou 2013, 43). This is because ambush marketers hardly

ever use a registered trademark; “instead they refer to an even creatively and use their


own marks and trade name to associate themselves with it” (Vassallo, 1341). Marmayou

further illustrates that an ambush marketing case can only be effective if it establishes

confusion in a consumers mind, which in most cases is avoided by the accompaniment of a

statement that the ambusher is not an official sponsor (Marmayou, 14).

An example of such a case would be National Football League v. Coors Brewing Co.

In this case, Coors said they were the “Official Beer of the NFL Players” in an advertising

campaign that was showed during football season. Coors had entered into a sponsorship

agreement with Players Inc, which was a marketing company associated with the NFL

Players Association. However, Coors never obtained an official license to use the NFL

trademark. As a result the NFL successfully proved that Coors infringed the NFL’s

trademark by successfully because there was consumer confusion as to whether Coors was

the official NFL sponsor (Nafziger 2011, 478). However, as previously mentioned, such

cases are rare, as most ambushers don’t blatantly use the trademarks of others.

Consumer Law-‐ Lanham Act

Section 43(a) of the Lanham Act states that consumers have the right to be

protected from any “false or misleading description of fact, or false or misleading

representation of fact which”

(A) is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive as to the affiliation, connection, or association of such person with another person, or as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods, services, or commercial activities by another person, or (B) in commercial advertising or promotion, misrepresents the nature, characteristics, qualities, or geographic origin of his or her or another person’s goods, services, or commercial activities, (Trademarks)

The case of Mastercard International v. Sprint Communications demonstrates the

use of the Lanham Act in a case against ambush marketing. During the 1994 World Cup,

Mastercard was the official sponsor and had a license to use the World Cup Trademark on

all “card-‐based payment and account access devices. Although Sprint was a telephone

company, they began using the World Cup trademark on all of their calling cards.

Mastercard sued sprint for false advertising (Vassallo 1342). In this case the consumer law


was effective in protecting the sponsorship rights of Mastercard and Sprint was prohibited

from using the World Cup marks on their calling cards. This case set the precendent to,

“prevent sponsors from exceeding the bounds of sponsorship packages” (Nafziger , 479).

Prevention of Unfair Competition

Another method of trying an ambush marketer in court is to claim that the

ambusher has implied an official association therefore, “giving rise to an unfair competition

claim through the misappropriation of goodwill” (Nafziger, 479). In countries that follow

Common Law there is no specific legislation that prohibits unfair competition. However,

there are similar concepts that are prohibited such as “passing off”, “injurious falsehood”,

“inducement to breach a contract” and “breach of confidence” (Marmayou , 48). An example

of a case including “passing off” would be the case of ICC Development v. Arvee Enterprises

& Phillips. In this case Phillips claimed that if you bought a Phillips audio system you could

win a ticket to the World Cup. The International Cricket Council had entered into contracts

with sponsors that year, but Phillips was not one of them. The ICC claimed that the Phillips

ads constituted passing off, unfair competition and ambush marketing and therefore

sought an injunction. The court ruled that the slogan issued by Phillips only implied that

purchasers may win a prize, but did not claim that Phillips was a sponsor (Vassallo 1346).

This demonstrates such a case in which a company creatively associates itself with another

event while circumventing any legislation that may imply illicit activity.

First Amendment

In many cases, the ambush marketer may claim first amendment rights of free

speech, especially when it comes to creative use. The First Amendment protects

commercial speech, but only if such speech is not false or misleading which is usually not

the case in ambush marketing cases (Nafziger, 480). In the case of New Zealand Olympic

and Commonwealth Games Associatio Inc v. Telecom New Zealand, The New Zealand

Olympic Association sued Telecom for their ad that featured the word “ring” in the

configuration of the Olympic rings. In addition the slogan, “With Telecom mobile, you can

take your own phone to the Olympics” (Vassallo, 1348). Although this case did not take


place in the US and therefore could not be protected by the first amendment it illustrates

that fact that if such speech is not misleading to the consumer, it is difficult to grant an

injunction. Such was the case, in which the court found that the “typical newspaper reader”

would not be misled by the ad (1348). An example that takes place in the US did so during

the Winter Games in Salt Lake City Utah. During the 2002 Olympic Games, a religious

association handed out pamphlets with five colored fish in the form of the Olympic Rings

and used the words “Sowing the Seed in Salt Lake City—the New Testament Souvenir—

Winter Games Salt Lake City, Utah”. In this case the United States Olympic Committee did

not challenge the organization because of the First Amendment defense in addition to the

fact that it would be unlikely for consumers to believe that a religious group would sponsor

the Olympics (Nafziger 480).

Fair Use

The fair use defense allows someone to use a mark if it is used in good faith to

describe the goods or services. In the previously mentioned case of NFL vs. Coors, Coors

claimed a defense of fair use. However, the court rejected Coors claim stating that Coors

wanted to capitalize on the goodwill of the NHL, and was not utilizing the NFL trademark in

a descriptive sense. (Nafziger, 480).

Disclaimers

In the case of the National Football League v. Governor of Delware it was established

that in some forms of ambush marketing, a disclaimer can be used to avoid liability

(Nafziger, 480) Another example of the success of ambush marketing due to a disclaimer

would be during the 1992 Stanley Cup Pepsi put on an advertising campaign titled “ Diet

Pepsi $4,000,000 Pro Hockey Playoff Pool” in which, “Pepsi invited the public to collect

specially marked promotional materials, such as bottle caps, cups and scratch cards”

(Vassalo 1345) . If a consumer in a specific area won a certain number of games, they

would receive prizes. Pepsi did put out a disclaimer on all of their promotional materials

that they were not the official sponsors of the NHL. In fact, that year, Coke was the official

sponsor. The court ruled that, “ the likelihood of any false impression to sponsorship was


minimal and, in any event was eliminated by the clear disclaimers”. Therefore the action

was dismissed from court. However, the case did set precedent on how the rest of the

nation and the world were to handle their ambush marketing cases (1346).

Specific Anti-‐Ambush Legislation

As illustrated, the laws already in place may or may not be effective in protecting

against ambush marketing strategies. As a result many countries have implemented their

own legislation. In 1978 the United States passed the Amateur Sports Act amended as the

Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act of 1998. The act grants the United States

Olympic Committee exclusive control over the Olympic Marks in the US. This differs from

normal trademark protection in the terms that it is not necessary to prove consumer

confusion and that the defendant would not have the defenses outlined in the Lanham Act

(Nafziger, 482). Until other legislation such as the Amateur Sports Act is passed, ambush

marketing will continue to present itself as a problem in global sporting events (Seguin,

2011, 301).

Controversial Nature of Ambush Marketing

In many cases, fans do not understand or notice the difference between a corporate

sponsor or ambush marketing. As a result, many fans mistake the ambusher for the official

sponsor. Due to this occurrence, official sponsors worry that,“ ambush marketing will

diminish the value of the exclusive rights acquired at some cost by the sponsors of the

event” (Marmayou).

Ambushers, however, argue that within the framework of normal business their

actions are perfectly legal and ethical. In fact, they go as far as to say that it is their

obligation as a business person to take advantage of a business opportunity. A company

may claim that, “without ambushing it is otherwise denied the right to participate in an

important promotional opportunity due to the inability to meet the cost of official

sponsorship and further that their duty to stockholders demands that ambushing activity

be undertaken” (Meeneghen).


While efforts to decrease ambush marketing for global sporting events are done

with good intentions it is also necessary to allow unaffiliated businesses to take advantage

of business opportunities. In addition, trying to prevent ambush marketing can interfere

with individual’s freedom of expression. For example, an individual soccer player should be

able to chose which brand, Nike or Adidas, they would like to sponsor them, no matter who

the official sponsor of the World Cup is. As a result, laws made to regulate ambush

advertisers should done carefully.

Ambushers Appealing to Political and Cultural Environments

Many of 2014’s world cup official sponsors will have more to worry about with their

marketing campaigns due to the political unrest in Brazil. The violence in Brazil is mostly

made up of protestors who are, “fed up with high poverty, a lack of health care, and poor

public services in the shadow of $11 billion event preparations”. Instead of seeing such an

environment as a marketing disaster, Coca-‐Cola, one of FIFA’s official sponsor’s decided to

take advantage of the situation by establishing itself as a socially responsible corporation.

Coca-‐Cola has launched a local program called Colevito, “which it created in 2009 to teach

job skills. Coke will employ about 1,000 Colevito graduates across Brazil during the World

Cup”. In addition, Coke has produced a series of documentary-‐style short films of a 92,000

mile tour through 90 countries for the championship trophy. During the tour Coke

successfully reached 175 markets, with more than one million people viewing the cup. In

addition, Brazilians were allowed to touch the solid-‐gold World Cup trophy, despite FIFA’s

normal rules of, ”only tournament champions and heads of state to touch the trophy” due

to the lack of all citizens in Brazil to view the trophy. Not only did these efforts reinforce

Coke’s, “The World’s Cup” theme, but it appealed to Brazil’s culture and its love of soccer

(Business).

Adidas, also one of FIFA’s official sponsors have taken advantage of Brazil’s love of

soccer by giving an official World Cup Ball to any Brazilian born on the day of their

campaign launch.


IOC and Regulations

Most companies are limited to ambush marketing because of the increase in cost of

entry for sponsorship of main events. This becomes a major problem because it takes away

from the actual sponsor of the Games (Chanavat & Desbordes 2014, 152). And because of

this, the IOC says that the host countries have to adopt regulations in order to protect the

symbolism of the event. When companies decide to join in and use the symbols of the

events such as the Olympics, FIFA, UEFA, and many more, there is high tension between the

actual sponsors and the wannabe sponsors or Ambushers (153).

Some say that ambush marketing came to at the Montreal Olympics in 1976. In 1984

at the Los Angeles Olympics, Fuji was the original sponsor, meaning they paid for the rights

to become the partner. And Kodak sponsored the broadcasting of the Games on ABC. What

Kodak was hoping to do was make the people think they were the sponsor instead of Fuji

(154).

Some probably think that Ambush marketing is a simple, one kind of strategy tactic.

They will soon find out that they could not be any more wrong. Some examples of past

tactics and present tactics are; soccer teams have contracts that vary from the individual

players. This allows players to wear the team sponsor on their shirts, and different sponsor

on their feet. In the article “Towards the regulation and restriction of ambush marketing?

The first truly social and digital mega sports event: Olympic Games, London 2012” there is

an example of David Beckham. He was seen wearing the Nike swoosh brand on his shirt

because Nike has a contract with the team. Yet he was also wearing Adidas cleats, this was

allowed because of his other contract, his personal endorsement contract. Another example

involving soccer player Wayne Rooney; he had used social media (Twitter) to advertise

Nike, this linked Nike to the team that Rooney was associated with, however Adidas was

the official team sponsor. This proves that Nike was undermining Adidas. When using

social media to advertise for a company is now known as social ambush, this is what Wayne

Rooney had been a part of (156).


What Advertisers Should Look out for

In the London Games, the controllers have come up with rules to avoid the

happening of Ambush Marketing. With the economy being the way it is, mege sports events

have become more and more popular. This is the way to reach millions of people. The

example used in the article “The London Olympics 2012: what advertisers should watch”

was Nike in the 1996 Summer Olympics. They had run advertisements through the Atlanta

area and it turned out that when asked, the population thought that Nike was the official

sponsor, however it was actually Adidas that was the official sponsor. To become a

sponsor, companies have to pay their way in (Taylor 2012, 459). Along with this example,

Taylor listed out five issues that were worth following at the London Olympics, they were

(459):

1. The continued growth of sponsorships and whether there is greater effort to

measure the effectiveness of sponsorships

2. Digital advertising’s role in the Olympics

3. How advertisers in traditional media capitalize on the high viewership of the

Olympics

4. The trend towards Olympic sponsors considering corporate social responsibility

issues in advertising

5. The degree to which ambush marketing during the Olympics continues to occur

There is a much greater interest in sponsorships, as stated before, because of the

viewers the company gets when it is connected to a mega sporting event such as the

Olympics and FIFA and many others. It is stated in the article that the London Games have

11 “official sponsors. To become one of these, you have to be ready to pay between $80 and

$100 million to be able to sponsor both Summer and Winter Olympics. Sometimes the

ambushers get time in the spotlight for “acting out” you could say. For example, ambush

marketing took place at a World Cup game in South Africa (461). Four women showed up

wearing the colors of another beer company (Bavarian Beer), which were the orange

colors. This was a wrong doing because the official sponsor was Budweiser. This caused

some turmoil and led to them being in the spotlight. Ambush marketing isn’t always a walk


in the park though, these four women received so much attention because they were

possibly facing some jail time for doing this (463).

Sponsoring and Ambush Marketing

Why do people choose to be sponsors? Being able to sponsor a mega-‐sport event is

one of the most popular ways to reach mass amounts of people. When reading “The role of

Mega-‐sports event interest in Sponsorship and Ambush marketing Attitudes”, it said that

businesses choose sponsoring because mega sports event can transmit promotional

messages to billions of people through television and other ways of communication

(Macintosh, 2012, 44). The desire to be affiliated with those five rings is the highest when

comparing sponsorship with any other mega sporting event. By being a sponsor there is a

huge benefit, it gets your brand out there and puts your brand in the populace's eye. Makes

them want to be like the athletes and wear what they are wearing. Nevertheless, the

International Olympic Committee (IOC) brought in a vast amount of money from the

sponsors in 2010. The amount that they profited was around $866 million. All of this was

given to the IOC from the nine sponsors that paid to have their name correspond with the

mega event (43). This brings up the question again of why become a sponsor when you can

create advertisements that are placed in the people’s minds? To answer this question; with

all of the high interest to gain as much as a sponsor does causes some issues. Ambush

marketing is said to be known as “a planned effort by an organization to associate itself

indirectly with an event in order to gain at least some of the recognition and benefits of

being an official sponsor of the Games” (44). All ambush marketing does is confuse the

population as to who is the real sponsor. In the article written by Macintosh, he says that

he found that 69% of people had no impact on their purchasing habits. Macintosh

conducted a test to see if respondents who have a higher level of interest in the Olympic

Games will have more positive sponsorship attitudes than those with lower levels of

interest in the Games. In the results, 619 surveys were handed out and finished. The people

who had higher levels of interest in the Games showed that they held more serious

attitudes about ambush marketing. This means that the higher the levels, the more likely

you will support the sponsors and their athletes. Then another result that was found was


that those with were more engrossed feelings in the Olympic Games viewed the official

sponsors as industry leaders. Also the results showed that those with certain dimensions

can tell the difference between official sponsors and non official sponsors (47). This all

makes sense if you take it into consideration. It is more likely that a person who is not

interested in the Games is less likely to tell the difference between a real or an ambusher.

IOC Creating rules to Keep out Nike

The article “Brand Police are on the Prowl for Ambush Marketers at London Games”

states that the IOC has been accused of being over protective of their sponsors. Also, this

article says that Nike is the top dog in the Ambush marketing game. And the IOC has come

up with rules to keep Nike from taking away from official sponsors. The article states that

Nike would be taking it easy which will take off some of the pressure of the shoulders of

Adidas (Segal, 2012). This came as a relief for Adidas because they were reported to have

paid $62 million to become a sponsor. However Nike will not be totally out of the Games in

London because they sponsor the United States Olympic Committee, this means that Nike

gear will be worn throughout the competition (Segal).

The IOC has come up with a vast amount of rules that is helping to stop ambush

marketing. This only took them two decades to accomplish, but it may be coming true.

Adam Rendle is a London Lawyer and he stated that anything looking like it possibly could

be linked to the Games is at risk of creating an association. This is helping the sponsors get

their brand awareness out there without having turmoil created with the other brands that

did not pay for sponsorship (Segal).

Nike Goes for Gold

In this article, the Olympic Delivery Authority is described ODA. This group watches

out for ambush marketers and penalizes them for what they have done. After the exchange

rate of pound to dollar, the charges can be up to over $31,000. They were working very

thoroughly to stop the non-‐sponsors of the Games (Passikoff, 2012). They were

anticipating some advertisements that would try to go above and beyond the rules and


regulations. But the Olympic Delivery Authority is prepared to stop them from gaining

anything from those advertisements (Passikoff). With the regulations that they have

created, these allowed them to have police up to 200 meters around a location.

To go around these rules and regulations, Nike made a very creative advertisement

that had athletes in towns called “London”. This was very sneaky; there was no direct

naming of the Olympics however one cannot help but make the connection (Passikoff).

Many companies have come to terms with Ambush Marketing, however Nike is still

trying to overcome the rules and regulations. The commercial that I talked about above,

Nike placed that out in the world in 2012 for the London Olympic Games. This just shows

how creative Nike has been in the past.

FIFA Example

Another time that Nike had been creative was when they came up with the FIFA

advertisement. Where they started out with kids just playing regular soccer then they turn

into professionals like Ronaldo and others from teams all around the world. This was a

silent introduction into the FIFA world cup. Adidas was not happy with this advertisement.

Because, as I said before, Adidas has the contract with teams where they are able to have

them wear cleats that have the Adidas logo on them because they have personal

endorsement contracts.

There are many examples of Ambush Marketing in Games around the world. We as

consumers, don’t see it all the time, it is hard to pinpoint. The majority of most Ambush

Marketing campaigns use subliminal messaging to catch our eye and it sticks in the back of

our heads.

2012 London Organizing Committee Contract

As previously mentioned ambush marketing is described as “a planned effort by an

organization to associate themselves indirectly with an event“(Hartland 2012, 69) and by

doing this they attempt to “gain at least some of the recognition and benefits that are

associated with being an official sponsor” (69). For the 2012 Olympic Games, London’s


original bid had to include measures to prevent ambush marketing. Once London was

awarded the Games they had to pass “legislation that made it illegal for companies that are

not official sponsors to link their products with the Games” (69).

The London Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games, LOCOG, was put in place

to prevent potential infringements on the Games from happening. LOCOG was required to

enter into the “Host City Contract, obligations under this contract meant fulfilling all

commitments made in the bidding process including protection for the official sponsors”

(70). Although many believe that this Act my have gone to far. Within the document it

stated that representation is “any image, graphic design, sound or word of any kind which

is likely to suggest to the public an association between a person, goods or services and the

London Olympics” (71). It also stated that association was defined as being any kind of

“contractual or commercial relationship, corporate or structural connection; or the

provision of financial or other support” (71).

The key terms that was considered forms of associations for the 2012 Olympic

Games included: Games, 2012, twenty twelve, two thousand and twelve, gold, silver,

bronze, London, medals, sponsors, and summer (72). Using any two of these words in

conjunction was considered a “violation with a significant fine” (Taylor 2012, 462).

Research conducted with Google advance showed that there was 2,284,414 found

violations of the contract. The majority of these hits was not to promote the company but

but innocent coincidence such as communities, local councils, student communities,

charities, etc. (Hartland 2012, 77). An example of this would be a local school wanting to

promote its 2012 Summer Sports Day. By using these words in their promotions would

“according to the letter of the law, be an infringement under the measures taken to protect

the Olympic brand” (72).

The UK’s Chartered Institute of Marketing believes “ the Act goes far beyond its valid

remit of preventing ambush marketing and preserving investment value for official

sponsors” because of the examples just mentioned (72). They believe that it “fails to give

allowance to the minuscule efforts of small and medium sized companies to gain some

benefit from the presence of the Games” (72).

Does the Act go to far? Should it only apply to companies that own a certain amount

of market share or have a certain amount of revenue and income? Even with this Act, major


companies such as Nike, Red Bull, Subway, and many others have still had effective

advertising without violating the Act. Let’s take a look at how these companies strategies of

their ambush marketing.

2012 London Olympic Games Examples of Ambush Marketing

Nike for the 2012 London Olympic Games launched Find Your Greatness Campaign.

Nike’s insight behind this campaign was ”a powerful message to inspire anyone who wants

to achieve their own moment of greatness in sport, launched just as the world focuses on

the best of the best” (Nike 2012). Nike showed clips of everyday athletes training around

the world with a “common thread that the locations are all called London” (Nike). One

scene at a London gym, another at rugby matches in East London, South Africa. Also a

female boxer is practicing in Little London, Jamaica and in London, Ohio kids are playing

baseball. Nike was able to create a campaign around the word London with out actually

featuring London, England in their campaign. They got a lot of awareness with this

campaign by linking it with social media. This is an extremely well thought and produced

ambush-‐marketing tactic helped “Nike dominate over Adidas by a wide margin” (Global

Language Monitor 2012).

Subway had a different approach to the their ambush marketing campaign for the

2012 London Olympic Games. In 2008, Subway signed Michael Phelps to “capitalize off the

partnership over the last four years in advance of the 2012 Olympic Games” (Forbes, &

Jessop 2012). Over those four years Phelps “produced at least 30 different commercials”

(Forbes, & Jessop). From “July 18 through August 15-‐ during the days surrounding the

Olympic Games,” fans will not see advertisements by Subway featuring Phelps because of

the strict Act. Although he cannot be a sponsor during the actual games he has already

connected himself over the years with subway. Therefore, in consumer’s minds he is still

the official sponsor, not realizing they haven’t seen a commercial in awhile. This ambush

strategy helped rank Subway above McDonald’s, an official sponsor, in the Global Language

Monitor Brand Affiliation Index (Global Language Monitor 2012).

Ambush Marketing is not only done through commercial advertisements but also

the attire of the competing athletes. The “Shoe War” was a big issue leading up to London


Olympic Games. This is because “Adidas is the official sponsor of the London Games, but a

problem arises because individual Olympic teams have their own contracts with individual

companies” (Taylor 2012, 462). An example of this is “runner Mo Farah is sponsored

personally by Nike, but the British Olympic Association is Sponsored by Adidas” (462). A

conclusion of this came out that “competition footwear is exempt because it is classified as

equipment, but medal ceremonies and warm-‐up create a problem as the athlete is under

pressure to wear the official brand” (463). Another accessory related ambush is Dr. Dre

and his Beats headphones when he “sent British team members special versions of the

Beats range branded with union flag colours” (Guardian, & Sweney 2012). This ambush

strategy helped Dr. Dre increase awareness in the 2008 Beijing Olympics when the

company “gave then to basketball star LeBron James and members of Team USA”

(Guardian, & Sweney). Panasonic, official sponsor believed this to be ambush marketing

and was “aggrieved by the stunt” (Guardian, & Sweney).

2014 Sochi Olympic Games Examples of Ambush Marketing

Ambush marketing was also very predominant in the latest 2014 Sochi Olympics

Games as well. Every year the language monitor creates a marketing report by brand

affiliation with both sponsors and non-‐affiliated sponsors of the Olympic Games. It is a

“proprietary, longitudinal study that analyzes the global association between individual

brands and the Sochi Winter Games” (Global Language Monitor). The top 4 marketers’ of

the Sochi Games rated by Brand Affiliation Index was Redbull, P&G, Samsung, and Subway

(Global Language Monitor). Both P&G and Samsung being official sponsors and Redbull

and Subway being unofficial sponsors. Once again Subway like previously mentioned in

the 2012 London Olympic Games used previous Olympic sponsors, Michael Phelps and

Apollo Ohno, once again leading up to the Games to help ambush the 2014 Sochi Games, but

how did Red Bull do it?

Red Bull’s marketing is unlike any of their other competitors. Redbull has “strong

links with extreme snow sports. They sponsor top athletes such as Sarah Hendrickson,

American world champion ski jumper. No only are these top athlete’s attire sponsored by

Redbull but all aspects of the snow sports including the making of many games outside the


Olympics. Because of Redbull’s strong ties with snow sports year round, not just during the

Olympics it helps keep awareness up and attention increases once the winter Olympics

begin.

Prevention Of Ambush Marketing Throughout this paper we have discussed the history of ambush marketing, the legal

issues of ambush marketing, the Olympic committees and their roles, and pervious

examples in past Olympics. Although we have yet to discuss how to prevent ambush

marketing. Many believe that ambush marketers are thieves, knowingly stealing something

that does not belong to them” (Payne 1998, 325). Also no other organization is more

“directly affected by the trend than Olympic Games organizers,” for the success of the

Olympics we must do everything in our power to prevent ambush marketing (326). In a

survey, research shows that 72% of respondents believed that the Games would not be

viable without the support of sponsors (326). In Conclusion, the International Olympic

Committee (IOC) must take steps to protect the Olympic sponsorship program, with such

actions discussed below.

First way to help protect the exclusive rights of the sponsors is ambush-‐marketing

education. The IOC believes that “public relations is becoming one of the best ways to

control ambush marketing” (327). By educating opinion leaders, the media, and consumers

on how ambush marketers are “trying to deceive them into believing that they too are

supporting the event, when they clearly are not” (328). This tactic has worked very well

previously in the past such as for the Atlanta Games during the 1996 Centennial Olympic

Games. By increasing understanding and gaining support for the policies will help “render

ambush marketing unacceptable in the minds of the consuming public, media and business

peers” (328).

Secondly to prevent ambush marketing the International Olympic Committee must

define the nature of exclusivity. This involves “specifying the core sponsorship rights that

are to be included in the marketing package” (328). This includes but is not limited to the

rights to the event, he rights to the international federation, the rights to the national team

or even to the individual athlete, and then to identify the rights not included (328). It is


necessary to determine the exclusive rights because “as the integrity of these rights is

chipped away, so the likelihood of sponsors withdrawing their support or at least

demanding that the fees be reduced” (327).

A third and fourth step to consider is monitor alternative programs and prohibition

of non-‐sponsor association. By monitoring alternative programs ensures that “the agreed

exclusive rights are not violated” (329). While prohibition of non-‐sponsor associations

prevents non-‐sponsors form “gaining a perceived sponsorship link through joint

promotions with any official sponsor” and in effect this prohibits “an ambusher from

gaining Olympic association through a joint promotion (329).

Another tactic to prevent ambush marketing is creating a clean venue, by controlling

all forms of commercial activity, including “concessions, franchises, and type of food sold in

restaurants” (329). By specifying things from credit cards to brands of soft drinks to be

served. Once there is a clean venue and all items are sponsored related, the next task is to

“police infringements of agreements” to help ensure the sponsor’s rights (329).

Once the above tactics have been implemented the final steps would be to

coordinate with broadcasters, control of Olympic imagery, and banning licensed

merchandise and hospitality programs. These elements help the official sponsor have first

rights to all broadcast sponsorship and advertising rights for the events, as well as control

the use of symbols and words related to the Games as mentioned in the 21012 London

Organizing Committee Contract. Finally, by banning the use of licensed merchandise and

hospitality program this prevents the licenses from retail sale. This includes “official ticket

vendors are forbidden from selling tickets to the Games to non-‐official sponsors for use in

hospitality programs, competitions, and promotions,” because in the past this has been

successful attempts at ambush marketing (330).

Conclusion

In Conclusion, ambush marketing, the attempt by organizations to mislead

consumers into crediting that they are supporting a sports event has been around the

Olympic Games for many previous years and many years to come. The Olympic Games is

doing everything in their power to keep the official sponsors in control and have majority


of the recognition and spotlight. Although the examples above show as ambush marketing

grows the dynamic between marketers and the corporate event planners will change

dramatically and cause issues for funding sporting events in the future. Therefore, the

committee must strengthen rules and regulations, inform consumers, and change attitudes

so corporations such as Kodak, Nike, Subway, Redbull, and other large non affiliated

sponsors can not take credit that belongs to official sponsors Prevention is easier than a

cure so if the IOC can make a stand now, society will hopefully see a change in the

marketing of the Olympic games and less ambush marketing.


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Ambush Marketing in the Olympic Games

Marketing

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