DPRK Olympic Teams Find Sponsors
Since China’s star Olympic athletes have signed endorsement contracts with western sports apparel firms, their Chinese competitors have looked to the “Land of the Morning Calm” to help them cash in on the ‘08 Olympics (and beyond)…
Press release here (PDF): News_Release_Sponsorship_17Jan07.pdf
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Female Weightlifters, Spanish Basketball Stars, and Kim Jong-il
Slate
Jacob Leibenluft
7/25/2007
Chinese companies can’t compete with the world powers when it comes to locking up megastars. Olympic gold-medalist hurdler Liu Xiang, who will likely emerge as the biggest Chinese star of the Beijing games, has a deal with Nike. One of China’s leading sports-marketing consultants told me that every starter on the national basketball team has a deal with a foreign brand. Yi Jianlian, whom the Milwaukee Bucks selected with the sixth pick of the NBA draft, had a Nike contract by the time he was 16.
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At the same time, Chinese shoe companies’ Billy Beane-like quest for hidden value has led to a few questionable decisions. Most sneaker companies would shy away from sponsoring the North Korean Olympic team. At the 2004 Summer Games in Athens, the DPRK won a grand total of five medals, none of them gold. Besides, the Hermit Kingdom doesn’t exactly conjure up the kind of brand associations most shoe companies are looking for. But Erke’s sponsorship of North Korea has a simple explanation. North Korea’s strongest sports include gymnastics, table tennis, and diving, all of which draw huge support and TV audiences in China.