Brand Premium of Team Canada & Why the Olympics Matter

So here we are- less than an hour away from what will likely be the most watched hockey game in North American history: Canada vs. the USA Olympic gold medal. The game will also likely be the most watched program in Canadian history. (Incidentally the record is held by Salt Lake City’s Olympic gold medal game between Canada and the USA). But this game has game some extras that make it special. First, and most obviously, Canada is gunning for gold of “the nation’s sport” right at home. Second, at the time that I am writing this, the USA has already won the most winter Olympic medal in winter Olympic history (granted there are more events than ever before but still…) and Canadian athletes have already done its $118 million “Own the Podium” program proud by delivering more gold medals to the host country than ever before in Olympic history. So this game- with the most profile event at the Olympics is a battle of the Olympic champions. Here are a couple musing on the game and the Olympics.

The Brand Premium of Canada’s hockey players.
In marketing there’s something called “price premium” measure of brands. Basically, you compare 2 equivalent brands’ pricing. The difference between the two prices is the perceived “brand premium”. For example, if you compare “Kellogg’s Corn Flakes” 575g ($4.99) to “President’s Choice Flakes of Corn” 575g ($3.99), you get a brand premium of $1 for Kellogg’s. The theory is that the Kellogg brand is worth $1 more. How does this relate to today’s game? I cranked out a few numbers, and the average Team Canada player makes around $3million more per season than the average player on Team USA. On a per game basis (assuming a player plays 84 games a year), that amounts to about $35,000 per player per game. If ice time is 18 minutes, that’s $2200 per minute. Remember, that’s not what the shift is worth- that’s the “brand premium”.

Why the Olympics Matter.
Olympics are so wonderful for a bunch of reasons: Olympics generate excitement about sport which in turn inspires kids (and kids at heart) to pick up healthy activities; Olympians are role models (most of the time) for gracious winning and defeat; and the Olympics give nations a healthy way express nationalism. By watching the Olympics, citizens of a nation root for their home country while at the same time are forced to realize the diversity of talent around the world. And for these reasons, I will always be a fan of the Olympics.

Canada's ad to the world

Tonight, hundreds of millions of folks got a look at Canada through our Olympic ceremony opening. In short we had a 3 hour ad to the world about our country. It’s a marketers dream to have an audience like that. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it’s a one time shot with a million moving parts. What succeeded and what failed?

Generally when an ad fails, it’s not because of faulty execution- it is because of the shoddy planning. Think of the Microsoft ads featuring Jerry Seinfeld. Excellent execution but totally missing the mark for what consumers needed to hear from Microsoft. Another ad that missed the mark was the Olympic ad for GM that showed hockey players being assembled on the GM assembly line. A very cool execution but a message irrelevant to the GM brand.

Today we witnessed some outstanding planning and excellent execution for our Canadian ad as well as some terrible planning and miserable execution. Let’s take a look.

You would be hard pressed to find anyone who was not blown away by the visual extravaganza tonight. Using the crowd as an artistic canvas to showcase Canadian landscape, seasons, and culture is nothing short of brilliant. The planners dreamed up showcasing the diversity of our nation in very artistic ways- from young man running through wheat fields to visuals featuring falling autumn leaves of Quebec.

On the other hand, who dreamed up the idea of having Gretzky hop in the back of a pick up truck in the pouring rain to light the official torch? It made for such a sketchy visual that NBC didn’t even follow the lighting of the torch. Or, who thought it would be great to have an opera singer lip synch the Olympic hymn after the Chinese lip-synch fiasco? And, what’s up with 4 First Nations chiefs being (noticeably) absent for the start of the event? After all they are only sitting by the top IOC chiefs and the top dignitaries of our country (Prime Minister Harper and Governor General Jean). Finally, let’s put on a You Tube poet to make an ode to our nation. I just got the sense that some of the opening ceremonies seemed to be made by a committee. And that’s not the way to make our nation’s ad to the world.