Longer ‘Road to Rio’ fills calendar with sponsors

The Olympic marketing season will start earlier than ever because the U.S. Olympic Committee keeps finding sponsors willing to underwrite a longer promotional tour leading up to the Rio Games.

Liberty Mutual Insurance has signed a deal to return as presenting partner of the Road to Rio tour, which will kick off July 4 at the Wawa Welcome America festival in Philadelphia, more than 13 months before the 2016 Summer Games open. The tour ends in Boston during the Rio opening ceremony on Aug. 5, 2016.

Events will adopt a Rio theme with palm trees, beach volleyball and live music. Photo by: U.S. OLYMPIC COMMITTEE

The 10-event campaign, including a new Team USA Awards ceremony in December and augmented by a new mobile app, constitutes a major expansion from prior build-up campaigns for the last three Olympics, all of which started at the 100-day countdown before the Games. The USOC held one-day events in New York in 2010 and 2012 before expanding it to a 12-city, 13-stop tour tightly condensed during the 100-day window leading up to the 2014

Liberty Mutual is back on the road after a successful tour ahead of Sochi 2014. Photo by:U.S. OLYMPIC COMMITTEE

Sochi Olympics. For the first time, the tour includes multiday stops.

USOC marketing executives thought a longer tour, with fewer but larger events, could help even out dips in fan engagement in between Olympic Games, and sponsors have responded. “Eighty percent of what we’ve put out there, we’ve already gotten partnerships attached to it,” said Mitch Poll, managing director of partnership marketing. “We’ve got very few inventory positions left.”

The USOC is still looking for sponsors of a VIP reception at some of the tour stops, titled “Toast to Team USA,” as well as Paralympics packages of media and other digital assets sold in partnership with NBC. It’s possible the USOC will add tour dates, but organizers are happy with the schedule, Chief Marketing Officer Lisa Baird said.

Liberty Mutual, which first sponsored the tour going into Sochi, agreed to return as a presenting sponsor after seeing great results in 2014, said John Coombe, vice president of brand management and sponsorships. The company immediately wanted to see if it could get more mileage out of the tour, he said. “It didn’t take any arm twisting, if you will, to get us to agree to and help support a longer-term program.”

As the official medal insurer of Team USA, Liberty Mutual will host a medal pavilion where fans can take photos on a medal podium and meet Olympic medalists. The property-casualty insurer believes the association with the Olympic team’s message of responsibility and commitment are a fit for its brand, Coombe said.

Airweave, AT&T, BP, Citi, Kellogg’s and Samsung have signed on as associate partners, deals valued in the mid-six figures on top of their contracts as official USOC partners, Poll said. Terms of the Liberty Mutual presenting sponsorship were not disclosed.

Research indicates sports fans would respond to an even longer tour, Baird said, but the organization is leery of expanding too quickly and jeopardizing quality if it outstrips sponsor demand.

“I think from a marketing perspective, we only want to do it well,” Baird said. “So if there is a limitation right now, it is the resources that we want to bring to be able to tell that story well and, frankly, preserve the standard of execution we have.”

Each event will adopt a Rio-centric beach motif, with palm trees, a beach volleyball court, a zip line and a live music stage, sponsored by AT&T. No musical acts have been announced yet. Olympic gold-medal gymnast Nastia Liukin also has signed on to appear at events and promote the tour on social media.

In another change in strategy, the USOC has hitched its wagon to existing events in most cities, hoping to piggyback off large crowds already expected to be there. In 2014, 330,000 people attended the 13 Road to Sochi events. Philadelphia’s Wawa Welcome America festival alone draws 500,000 people. Executives are confident the Olympics brand is strong enough to avoid getting lost in the vendor crowd, Baird said.

Worldwide Olympic sponsor Dow will be the presenting sponsor of the inaugural Team USA Awards ceremony on Dec. 10 in Philadelphia. The year-end ceremony builds on the monthly team and athlete awards already awarded based on votes by fans and national governing bodies. Dick’s Sporting Goods, Kellogg’s, Samsung and USG are associate sponsors.

Smucker’s is the presenting sponsor of the Team USA media app, a mobile application featuring regular updates on Rio Games preparation, qualifying and competitions.

Wasserman Media Group is handling the tour for the USOC.