Sponsormania

Corporate brandstanding

Athletes will not be the only competitors in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. Along with runners, hurlers and jumpers will be almost three dozen major U.S. corporations vying for the consumer's attention. As official Olympic sponsors, they are chipping in about $116 million of the Games' $475 million cost.

Such "brandstanding," as public relations types call it, is fast gaining favor as a hot way for more and more companies to promote their names and products. Chief reason: the steep rise hi the cost of advertising in the mass media, particularly televison. This year about 1,000 corporations sponsored events of one sort or another, vs. some 400 in 1980.

The companies hope for a high rate of publicity return, and will probably get it. For the Olympics, for example, Coke becomes the official soft drink, and may say so in ads. American Express is the official credit card, McDonald's the official fast-food restaurant. Tokyo's Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd. grabbed the right to be the supplier of film and processing for the Games, edging out Eastman Kodak Co.

Milwaukee's Jos. Schlitz Brewing Co., now owned by the Stroh Brewery Co. in Detroit, puts more gusto into its corporate-event sponsorship than most companies. Its annual budget for such promotions runs to several million dollars, spent on such events as the ten-day New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival last spring, which featured 3,000 musicians, 300 music groups and nine stages, each with a Schlitz [ogo as a backdrop. Not so incidentally, 400,000 cups of Schlitz were sold. This year Schlitz foamed beyond local events and plunged into national rock-music promotions, including Fleetwood Mac's 30-city tour and the Who's performance in 40 places. Those cost Schlitz $1 million to $2 million each, but let it turn a catchy line in ads: "Schlitz Rocks America."

Brandstanding's effectiveness is hard to measure, but by some guesses it generates $10,000 worth of free publicity for every $1,000 spent. That has certainly been the payoff for Schlitz, even to the point of happily seeing others needling its bigger rival Miller. In September, just before its two-day Music Heritage Festival in Tennessee, the brewery got a pat from the Memphis Commercial Appeal, which ran an editorial headlined "It's Schlitz Time."

American Tobacco's Lucky Strike, 50 years ago the country's most popular cigarette but a wallflower during the past decade, is sponsoring bowling tournaments for its "Lucky Strikes Again" comeback campaign. Most bowlers, studies show, are smokers. Brown & Williamson underwrote Kool Jazz Festivals in 20 cities. R.J. Reynolds backs stock-car racing, rodeos, even country music festivals, but it enraged some Bostonians with its "Camel Concerts on the Common" series. GASP (Group Against Smokers' Pollution) protested and Reynolds withdrew its support.

There have been other misses. Dade County in Florida tried to draw tourists in June, an off month, by organizing an arts festival with $450,000 in support from American Express. Only a fourth of the anticipated crowd showed up. Such misadventures have not deterred the city of Chicago. Many companies back its summer Chicago Fest. Annual cost: about $6 million, almost $700,000 of it from Coke, Pepsi, RC Cola, Budweiser and Miller, among others.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.