Li-Ning brand at the Olympic

Not sure you have noticed this during the Beijing Olympic opening ceremony (amazing show by any standard, if you haven’t seen it, wait for the Bluray DVD to come out), Spain Olympic team all wear Li-Ning branded outfit (their Logo is a flying letter “L”, shared some traits from Nike’s logo). I think this is very smart move for a Chinese company, especially considering what Spain’s sport has accompolished this year (they win the title from UEFA (European Football), Nadal beats Federer at the Wimbeldon…). Imagine if Nadal claims the title of Man’s Tennish single game and wearing the LiNing brand on the podium, that will win a lot of people’s eyeballs.

What is more interesting is LiNng choose to give up on the battle with Addidas for outfitting Chinese delegation (the country where LiNing brand is growing from),  the offer price from Addidas is just too high - $80 million for the sponsorship, that is more than the total annual marketing expense of LiNing. China team is just too strong to pass for an advertising compaign (remember China was the 2nd and 3rd in the past two Olympic game medal list.

Now I don’t know when Li Ning (the founder and the CEO of the Li-Ning company)  watches a final game between Spain and China in tennis, which side he wants to win.

1 comment August 9th, 2008