The Olympics are always a blend of sports, politics, and marketing. The 2008 Olympics in China will be no exception. Over the objections of some, President Bush recently said he would attend (seehere).
Liu Xiang is China’s track superstar, known everywhere in China. He won the 110m hurdles in the 2004 Olympics, becoming the first Chinese track-and-field athlete to win a gold medal. He is also a Nike athlete. He has been at the heart of Nike’s successful marketing in China. Liu Xiang also became the first Chinese to take a gold medal at the world athletics championships recently held in Osaka after winning the 110m hurdles again (see here)
The following are a 6 minute video youtube of his recent 2007 world championship win and a 60 second Nike for the Chinese market.
His 2007 Osaka 110m hurdles win:
Nike has 3,000 "retail destinations" in more than 300 Chinese cities, with business approaching $1 billion per year (see here). Nike will be sponsoring many Chinese athletes in the 2008 Olympics.
The Nike Ad:
Reporting on the 2004 Olympics in October of 2004, Time online reported:
Nike swung into action even before most Chinese knew they had a new hero. The moment hurdler Liu Xiang became the country's first Olympic medalist in a short-distance speed event — he claimed the gold with a new Olympic record in the 110-m hurdles on Aug. 28--Nike launched a television advertisement in China showing Liu destroying the field and superimposed a series of questions designed to set nationalistic teeth on edge. "Asians lack muscle?" asked one. "Asians lack the will to win?" Then came the kicker, as Liu raised his arms above the trademark Swoosh on his shoulder: "Stereotypes are made to be broken." It was an instant success. "Nike understands why Chinese are proud," says Li Yao, a weekend player at Swoosh-bedecked basketball courts near Beijing's Tiananmen Square.
Such clever marketing tactics have helped make Nike the icon for the new China. According to a recent Hill & Knowlton survey, Chinese consider Nike the Middle Kingdom's "coolest brand." Just as a new Flying Pigeon bicycle defined success when reforms began in the 1980s and a washing machine that could also scrub potatoes became the status symbol a decade later, so the Air Jordan — or any number of Nike products turned out in factories across Asia — has become the symbol of success for China's new middle class. Sales rose 66% last year, to an estimated $300 million, and Nike is opening an average of 1.5 new stores a day in China. Yes, a day. The goal is to migrate inland from China's richer east-coast towns in time for the outpouring of interest in sports that will accompany the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. How did Nike build such a booming business? For starters, the company promoted the right sports and launched a series of inspired ad campaigns. But the story of how Nike cracked the China code has as much to do with the rise of China's new middle class, which is hungry for Western gear and individualism, and Nike's ability to tap into that hunger."(more from the article "How Nike Figured Out China" here).