Leading: A 10-year, $200-million sponsorship contract tied Nike to a football league full of gambling, black gold, and corruption. There are also sponsors such as Pirelli and Xinyuan Moto in the same embarrassing position. Are they facing a laughing stock, or is it a golden opportunity for a very good chance of bottoming out?
Nike is implicated in Chinese football
Nike Inc., the sporting goods company with the best global brand image, did not expect that a 10-year, $200-million sponsorship contract tied itself to a soccer league full of gambling, black gold, and corruption.
The China Football Super League (hereinafter referred to as "China Super League") - the highest level professional football league in the country, modeled on the English Premier League and best professional football club in China, has now become a corrupt and black gold show: taking bribes The players made shots towards their own goal; players, coaches, football officials... Each of the stakeholders captured illegal income under the football game's dark curtain; since October 16, 2009, the Guangdong Eagles executives were taken away by the police so far. For more than 100 days, news of the officials involved and the players being taken away were reported on almost every day.
These unceasing negative news undoubtedly made Nike feel frustrated. It has 9 years of sponsorship contract with China Super League. It does not want to make its own 200 million U.S. dollars worth of investment engulfed by the sea of ​​screaming and taunting.
This is not the result that Nike wants to see.
Fortunately, the Chinese Football Association has confirmed that on March 27th, the China Super League, which is a week later than originally scheduled, will reignite in Beijing. This undoubtedly gave Nike and other league sponsors a sigh of relief. This is good news in bad news. There are always games. In the previous month, they did not know whether the sponsored money would be outdated or not. They did not know if they would be involved in the gambling case. Of course, they did not make much hope for a good reputation through sponsorship.
One day at the end of February, the Nike Superintendent of the company appeared in the office of the general manager of the Zhongchao Company located at the East Tower of Xizhaosi Street in Beijing.
Nike has thrown a new proposal for Lang Xiaonong, the new general manager of China Super League: Don't think about Xi'an and Hangzhou, and put the new season's opening game at the Workers Stadium in Beijing. The reason for Nike is that Beijing is better than the other two competing cities in terms of popularity and rewards for championship teams: the successful experience of the Premier League and La Liga proves that the best team is best equipped with the best team. It will make the opening ceremony more exciting and more attractive.
This makes Lang Xiaonong very difficult. The 62-year-old league director of the former Chinese Football Association took over the company one month ago. One of the most important tasks is to stabilize Nike and other sponsors. As a witness to the professionalization process of Super League, Lang Xiaonong, who is known as the "Father of the Chinese Super League," understands that anyone at this sensitive time can feel unhappy and grow up. What made him hesitate was that the yellowish turf was not suitable for television broadcasting. According to the convention, only the city that submitted the application was eligible to host the opening ceremony, and Beijing had not previously been listed as a bidder.
However, Lang Xiaonong did not reject Nike's proposal. He immediately reported to Wei Di, director of the China Football Administration Center. After receiving the support of the new supervisor, he also telephoned Ronald, Honorary Chairman of Beijing Guoan. On the other end of the phone, Luo refused. After the relevant procedures were completed in Beijing Guoan, the opening ceremony of the Chinese Super League finally officially settled in Beijing on March 27th.
For Nike, the Chinese audience can continue to see the ubiquitous hook logo on the playing field, in the television footage and on the player's chest.
The Chinese Football Association obviously felt the pressure from sponsors. Their obedience to sponsors and the professional approach they have shown at this particular moment may make Nike who has been exposed to Chinese football for many years be flattered. According to Ma Chengquan, director of the League Football Department of the Chinese Football Association, both the Super League and the Footcare Center are "paying great attention to maintaining the interests of sponsors and listening to their voices."
In the short 16-year history of the China Football Professional League, more than 20 multinational companies and local companies, including Marlboro, Pepsi, Siemens, Ericsson, Canon, Philips, TOM, and Kingway Beer, have entered the ranks of its sponsors. Of course, those companies that are investing heavily in these ventures may lose as much as they get in this arena full of tragedy and comedy extreme emotions.
The ambitious Siemens Mobile has spent a total of 18 million US dollars in 2003 and 2004 for two consecutive years to sponsor the Chinese Football League. Rudi Lamprecht, president of the wealthy German company, boasted that he would use Siemens as the sales champion for Chinese mobile phone brands.
Krambot made a mistake. In early 2005, this Fortune 500 company, which had sponsored Real Madrid and Chelsea, withdrew from the China Super League ahead of time due to the bad environment of Chinese football. Subsequently, the mobile division run by Lamborgh was also thrown by the headquarters to Taiwan’s IT manufacturer Ming. In 2006, this desperate cell phone brand disappeared because of the bankruptcy of Ming Siemens Mobile.
The failure of Siemens Mobile to sponsor the Super League has shown the high risk of investing in the China Football League. With the help of Chinese football knocking on the door of the Chinese market and winning the Chinese people's favor, this law, once proven by Marlboro and Pepsi, seems to have failed.
However, Nike did not think so. It decided to take a risk on the football tournament that has been controversial for several years. The world’s largest sports goods supplier who entered the Chinese market for many years, when fans were far away from football and sponsors went away, chose to go against the trend. In the beginning of 2009, they signed the contract to become the equipment sponsor of the Chinese Super League and they signed for 10 years. The total amount of US$200 million in sponsorship is the largest since the professionalization of Chinese football.
Prior to this, the value of commercial sponsorship in the Chinese Super League was like a stock that did not attract anyone to see, fell all the way, suffered a streaking (no sponsors), sponsors arrears, low-priced sales and reduced number of viewers, television The embarrassing experience of rebroadcasters, and the sponsorship fee has dropped sharply from Siemens's 81 million yuan (2004) to 32 million yuan (the nominal price of Jinwei Beer in 2008), dropping 60 percent. % is more.
"Nike is always looking for the right opportunities to participate in Chinese football," said Shay Peak, who was responsible for the development of sports markets in Nike China before 2002. "But it has been suffering from the lack of suitable forms of intervention." In 2004, it was still bidding. The "China Team" lost its old rival adidas to its main sponsor qualification and was disadvantaged in the field of Chinese football sponsorship.
In desperation, Nike who seldom excavated from a competitor from the adidas invited Zhang Jinsong, who was the manager of the football market, to become the manager of the sports marketing department at Nike China. Zhang was the direct leader of Adidas' "China Team" project. Relying on Zhang's deep connections with the Chinese Football Association, Nike has seized this opportunity to deeply intervene in Chinese football.
Nike thinks he has copied the big bottom of Chinese football.
In Europe, Nike will sponsor sponsored professional clubs such as Manchester United and pay at least $33 million a year. This time, it only needs to pay 15 million to 20 million U.S. dollars every year to enable all the players, coaches, and referees of the 16 Super League teams to wear embroidered logos both in training and competition. Nike equipment. In China, Adidas signed a total of six years of sponsorship for the Chinese national team that did not appear in the World Cup in 2002. It also reached US$60 million.
Like Nike, the Italian tire manufacturer Pirelli and China’s private motorcycle brand Xinyuan Moto have made heavy investments in the Chinese Super League. They and Nike's judgments are exactly the same: the recovery of Chinese football is just around the corner, and the sponsorship of Super League is just right. The Pirelli, which spent 3 million US dollars for 3 years in the title, is equivalent to the cost of one season for Serie A and Inter Milan. The vice sponsor Xinyuan Motors invested more than 10 million yuan to sponsor a Super League team with the title. Not much higher.
"It should be said that the sponsorship of the China Super League with signs of rebound is a good time," said Zhang Qing, the CEO of the key consulting firm of sports consulting companies. Nike and Pirelli have done a worthwhile business.
The answer submitted by the Super League in 2009 is also very bright. According to statistics from China Super League and CCTV Sofuri, over 3.9 million live audiences and 190 million television viewers watched the Super League competition in the 2009 season, and 360,000 people participated in the interactive game “Superpassionâ€. These are the data for sponsors.
Bai Bei, president of Pirelli Asia Pacific, was very excited at the Chinese Super League Awards at the end of last year. "Now it seems that the decision to sponsor Super League at the beginning of the year is a good decision." He said that under the promotion of the Chinese Super League, Pirelli has become a well-known tire brand in China.
However, the reality has made them look surprised.
The 2009 season has just ended. The Super League, which has not yet emerged from the excitement of creating a new record of attendance for five years, is like riding a roller coaster and crashing into the cold ice cave from the top of the sun. The strong involvement of the Ministry of Public Security has made the gambling case become startling and scandals have cropped up.
In order to complete the GM’s gambling mission, the players of Qingdao Hailifeng kicked the ball to their own goal; Guangzhou Guangyao Club could use only 200,000 yuan to exchange for a swift and clean 5:1 victory; the Football Association officials Fan Guangming obtained a bonus of 1.5 million yuan from a club for a fake ball agent; Lawrence Huang Junjie, who plays only more than 1,000 yuan in a game, can also open a Lexus luxury car worth several hundred thousand yuan; and the Chinese Football Association’s real power The character Nan Yong, who was taken away by the police, found out that there were 6 million yuan in bank cards. According to the rumor, he also had many valuable properties in Beijing.
From Qingdao Hailifeng in Zhongjia to Guangzhou Guangyao and Chengdu Sheffield United of China Super League, it seems that no club can prove its innocence. Chinese football has almost become the industry with the highest crime rate in China.
Even sponsors are involved. Nan Yong was involved in the 2006 sponsorship of the Fox. Due to the early withdrawal of the sponsor Siemens Mobile, the Super League lost its entire season in 2005. At the beginning of 2006, Nan Yong, the deputy chairman of the China Football Association and chairman of the China Football Association, who was in charge of the league affairs, went to the English Peninsula alone. Under the introduction of the familiar football agent Shirakawa, he locked a new sponsor, Ai Fox.
An anonymous prosecution letter stated that Affix's agent company ACE and the middle agent of the transaction, Shirakawa's BCD Company, were all purses companies and had already gone bankrupt. The Fox is actually a game agency that has just been established and is not strong enough. It has now ceased to exist.
Prev 1 2 Next Full Story