Business
Is loyalty to Puma causing Usain Bolt to lose out on big bucks?
— Part 1
Friday, March 19, 2010
SPRINT sensation Usain Bolt has been hailed as a track superstar whose earnings should be in the region of US$15 million by now. But nearly two years after he burst onto the world scene breaking records in a dazzling exhibition of athletic prowess, his earnings have not reached the levels that they should. The swimmer Michael Phelps is expected to bag US$100 million for his eight gold-medal haul in Beijing and is on his way to do so whereas Bolt can barely get out of the blocks in the earnings race.
He has endorsement deals with Puma, Digicel and Gatorade which net him in total of somewhere in the region of US$3.5 million a year – a pay packet a rookie American footballer takes home. His contract with mobile telephone service provider Digicel is reputed to be not that great; it is doubtful whether that brings in over US$2 million a year.
So why is an athlete who is a phenom, personable, clean- living and clean cut, telegenic and a marketer 's dream not minted in gold? Are his handlers asleep at the wheel? Sprint stars have inordinately short shelf lives and it is imperative that they maximise earnings while they can. It would be a sad state of affairs if Bolt was paraded out at supermarket openings in ten years time like some old racehorse sent out to pasture.
The top athletes of the day are: Tom Brady, Kobe Bryant, Lewis Hamilton Manny Packiow, Roger Federer, Tiger Woods, David Beckham, Ronaldo, Alex Rodreguez, Lebron James and Bolt. Yet Bolt comes way down at the bottom of that list when it comes to earnings. Why?
It’s called the Puma Theseus II, and it costs about US$40. It’s probably better known as the golden running shoe that track athlete Usain Bolt displayed to millions of fixated viewers worldwide after turning the100 metres field of athletes into despairing spectators at the 2008 Olympics. If there was ever a more profitable return on investment for a sports endorser, then the head of that company must have gobbled up a ton of Microsoft stock in the late 1980s.
Despite German shoe and sportswear maker Puma’s attempt to downplay the effect of Bolt’s gesture on their worldwide sales, his unabashed enthusiasm for his sponsor provided mileage that few mega-athletes can ever hope to achieve. Yet while Nike immediately took out full page ads in China sympathising with injured hurdler Liu Xiang and Visa began tooting Michael Phelps’ hydrophilic horn, Puma’s push for the newly crowned 100-metre and 200-metre Olympic champion was surprisingly low-keyed. At the time Puma’s marketing manager, Antonio Bertone, said, “When you do congratulation ads, are you doing it for Wall Street or the consumer.”
Bertone’s comment inspires the image of a company being truly passionate about the needs of their consumers, but what about the needs of their athletes? Usain Bolt’s image and name are undoubtedly among the most recognisable in athletes around the world today and yet when it comes to athlete earnings he is scarcely a blip on the Forbes Radar. The fact of the matter is that “Wall Street” campaigns are what companies such as Nike Inc use to promote their athletes, not only to consumers but to other non-competing companies that want a piece of the gravy train.
Tiger Woods is the world’s highest-paid athlete and even though his non-golf endorsements are considerable, his Nike Golf sponsorship is still the largest endorsement he enjoys. When Accenture became the first sponsor to drop Woods after the fallout from his recent debacle, the first thought that comes to mind is “Why does Accenture, a company that 95 per cent of the world doesn’t know about do need a golfer to promote it?” The answer is that they don’t need a golfer; they want to capitalise on his persona initially created by his primary sponsors. With Bolt’s undeniable talent and increasing fame, the athlete should be positioning himself to break into the ranks of those athletes who earn millions of dollars yearly, even while nowhere close to the level of worldwide acclaim that Bolt has achieved.
Puma has increased their efforts, especially since Bolt’s repeat success in Berlin this year, but in the end, can they do enough, will they do enough or do they have enough to give to potentially the biggest star the world has ever seen?
Contributed by: Your Money eZine