Olympic brand protection: draconian or justified?

Two billion pounds are needed to stage the 2012 Olympic Games, and LOCOG has to raise it somewhere.(1) What does it have to sell?  - tickets, broadcasting rights, merchandise, the exclusive right to use Olympic intellectual property (especially brands and symbols) and exclusive rights to ‘associate’ with the Games.

Since the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984(2) sponsorship money has enabled the Games to exist. The event has grown so large that the idea of any one city being able to afford it out of its public’s purse is now impossible. The value of broadcasting(3) and other product sponsorship rights dwarfs the amount of money that can be raised from selling tickets or furry mascots and t-shirts. The value of the sponsorship rights obviously depends on how much “exclusivity” is offered. The more that competitors are locked out of the game (pardon the pun) the higher the marketing value.

And so we have the special extended protection of the time-limited London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Act 2006 which creates the London Olympics Association Right (the so-called LOAR). The Act was introduced when London won the right to host the Games, and has been the cause of grumblings and assertions of ‘draconian’ ever since, as non-sponsors of the Games assess the strict limits it places on what they can and cannot do.

It is new legislation with no court precedents - LOCOG and its advisors need to test the extent of the law and tread various fine lines between maintaining their undertaking to protect the paying sponsors, warn off smaller operators who inadvertently tread too close, and yet not stifle the community spirit around the Games.

Branding information on the LOCOG website is detailed, and can seem to prohibit just about every utterance of ‘Olympics’ or ‘2012’. That’s not right, of course - to be objectionable under LOAR the use must tend to indicate an affiliation with or sponsorship of the Games which the user does not have (and, unlike the official sponsors, has not paid for). There are also numerous defences.

The big enforcement challenge for the London Olympics is going to be social media. In a mere four years since the Beijing Games the use of social media platforms has skyrocketed, and LOCOG can expect just about every athlete and most of the spectators to be carrying a smart phone with which they can Tweet real-time comments or post photos on Facebook or videos on YouTube. In many ways this should boost the community spirit around the Games and engage people in the event. The IOC is already calling London “the first conversational Games”.(4)

But the undertakings to the sponsors have to be honoured, and LOAR enforced. LOCOG will issue careful instructions to athletes and officials - no Tweeting about non-sponsor brand names, no journalistic reporting, and certainly no videos. The paying public will be harder to control. There is some concern(5) that posting photos of the Games on Facebook might run foul of LOCOG’s rules, but sharing for private purposes is not prohibited.

The grumbling about these laws and regulations often misses some essential points. The policy behind them is driven largely by the International Olympics Committee, and was a clearly stipulated part of the deal when London bid for the Games.

But the most important message that LOCOG needs to convey is: if they can’t raise the £2bn required through generously-enforced sponsorship deals, then either the British public must meet the shortfall or there is no Games. It is a misconception that the public has “paid for the Games” - the public expenditure goes into venues and infrastructure.(6) Presentation of the Games themselves is extra. So let’s hear it for Our Sponsors, and stop grumbling about using IP laws to give them value for their Olympic dollar.

(1) On Olympic fundraising see Kenyon, J  and Palmer, C  (2008) ‘Funding and sponsorship; the commercial impact of the 2012 London Olympic Games — some considerations’  Journal of Qualitative Research in Sports Studies, 2, 1,  29-44
(2) In that year Los Angeles was the only city left bidding for the Games, and to pay for them the IOC allowed it to set up the first private Olympic Organising Committee, creating the model used ever since.
(3) NBC is reported to have paid US$1.2 billion for the broadcast rights to London’s Olympics. Guardian, 6 June 2011
(4) Alex Huot, IOC’s Swiss-based head of social media, reported in the Guardian, 14 April 2012
(5) Guardian, 14 April 2012
( 6) The Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) is the public sector body responsible for the delivery of the new venues and infrastructure required for the Games. The ODA budget is drawn entirely from the public sector, including the National Lottery. Its budget, reported in March 2007, was £9325 million.


- Annette Freeman


This article appeared in the June 2012 issue of Intellectual Property Magazine

olympic fever

Merchandising the Olympics

Having lived - and worked in an intellectual property practice - through the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, it is interesting to see the same issues playing out in London as the 2012 Games approaches (please, no one sue me for using “2012” and “Games” in the same phrase).

There are many articles around which give a detailed look at the issues that face the legal team of the Olympic Committee of a host country, when the Games are almost upon them. First you have to negotiate all those license agreements with the sponsors whose funds make the Games possible; then you have to enforce them. This means everything from watching for sophisticated ambush marketing, to calling the small kebab shop to tell them that they can’t use the Olympic Rings on their sign. Even if they will be selling to Olympic tourists in the Olympic city of summer 2012.

One thing that often surprises the uninitiated is the very draconian levels of protection that are given to Olympic trade marks and logos. For example, the date “2012” is registered in all 45 classes of goods and services as a Community Trade Mark by the IOC. There are strict parameters, strictly enforced, about using “Games”, “London”, and “2012” as well as “Olympic” and the famous coloured rings.

But the truth of the matter is two-fold. Firstly, after the 2012 Games are done and dusted, the registration for “2012” will be worth nothing and will probably languish, as will many other temporary rights.

Secondly, such draconian measures are needed to protect the turf of the people who make the Games possible. No, not the athletes - the sponsors. Since sponsorship became a mainstay around the time of the Los Angeles Olympics, it has become the only way the expensive, slick, wonderful modern Olympics can possibly exist. Yes, host countries contribute enormous amounts, especially to infrastructure which will hopefully be of lasting value to their communities. But without the sponsors, no Games. And without protection for their trademarks, no sponsors.

olympic brands: reputation

A rough road...

I’m often looking out for news stories about brands and trade marks in the daily press. Recently an unfortunate one surfaced.

Headline on a story in The Guardian the other day: “Olympic brands caught up in abuse scandal”. If you’re a brand owner who has paid a hefty sponsorship dollar to sponsor a national team or particular athletes or sports at the London 2012 Olympic Games, the word “scandal” is no doubt not one you’d be happy to see associated with your name. In fact, Olympics or no Olympics, this is not a pretty story.

The Guardian article concerns an investigation into conditions at Bangladeshi sweatshops where underpaid and allegedly abused workers, mainly women, make the expensive and high quality sports clothes and shoes sold under flagship brands such as Adidas, Nike  and Puma. The companies have responded, saying that they have regular audits, monitoring visits, codes of conduct and a hotline for complaints.

The organisation War on Want claims that this is not ensuring fair conditions, and has released its own report on the Bangladeshi situation, entitled ‘Race to the Bottom’. A War on Want spokesman described the companies as “soiling the Olympic flag”, which is rather  melodramatic, but he’s mad as hell. Rightly so, if the allegations are correct, and despite all the Codes of Conduct in the world, women in poverty are being slapped, verbally abused, harrassed, under-paid and over-worked while they make runners and Team GB sports clothes.

This is not the only story around about luxury western products being produced in third world sweat shops. Apple (and Microsoft, Dell and Hewlett Packard) have had to fend off similar allegations about inhumane conditions in the factories in China which manufacturer its iPad and iPhone products.

What a disconnect there is here. Big brand companies spend so much money and effort in trying to ensure their brand is recognised as a symbol of trust, reliability, great design and superb quality. And then their business model of cheap production in China and the Third World shows up this symbol for the lie it is. What is wrong with this picture? Aren’t the manufacturing pipeline people talking to the marketing and PR people? Answer: they are now.

But there’s a bigger picture too. It is possible to be in business profitably and maintain decent ethical standards. Isn’t it? Time for some philosophical thinking and ethical leadership.