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As a world-class sporting event, the Olympics has become a battleground for brand marketing. Although LVMH, which has invested 150 million euros, is focusing its efforts on the Olympics, luxury consumption is showing weak growth under the influence of the global economic situation. In the crisis, the Paris Olympics may be an opportunity for French luxury giants to get out of the haze, but at the same time, this Olympics is also a stage for major sports brands to compete.

LV "hard implant"

The French luxury group LVMH was the host of this event, and naturally took the lead in sponsorship. Regarding the opening ceremony, Antoine Arnault, the eldest son of the group's head family, confidently said in an interview that it would be "very intuitively made by LVMH." He was indeed not exaggerating, and LVMH's placement in the Paris Olympics was very conspicuous. Not long after the opening ceremony began, the LV logo appeared in front of the camera.

According to LVMH official information, the group sponsored the Paris Olympics with a total amount of 150 million euros. During the opening ceremony, LVMH brands appeared in close-up shots many times, such as the torch stored in LV's suitcase, the Olympic medals were designed by Chaumet, the first jeweler to design medals for the Olympics, the volunteer uniforms were also made by LV, and the French athletes appeared on the field wearing Berluti dresses.

In order to let the audience "see into the heart", the opening ceremony short film showed LV's box-making process. When the last medal customized for this Olympic Games was completed, it was placed in the LV box and displayed in all directions, including close-up, long-range, indoor and outdoor.

After the opening ceremony, "LV hard advertising" became a hot search. Everyone was impressed by how much money LVMH Group spent. One netizen said: "The sponsor is different. The global advertising blockbuster premiered at the Olympics."

Different from the traditional advertising model, through the form of brand sponsorship, the iconic LV LOGO was frequently interspersed in the urban storyline of the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics. This type of event marketing can attract more attention and resonance from the media and consumers than traditional advertising. Zhou Ting, director of the Yaoke Research Institute, pointed out, "Not only that, event and content marketing also often have a higher input-output ratio, but the disadvantage is that event marketing has a certain degree of uncontrollability, and the media's independent dissemination often does not follow the brand's desired angle, which can easily bring the brand undesirable communication effects."

For LVMH, their brand logo can be seen everywhere during the entire Olympic Games, not just the opening ceremony. From medals, award boxes, trays to award clothing and other "long exposure" projects, they not only cover the highlights in the arena, but also extend to various scenes after the game. After all, stimulating people's emotions through fashion itself is far more effective than excessive marketing.

Making a comeback with the Olympics

Behind LVMH's frequent presence, its luxury consumption is not as hot as imagined. The financial report for the first half of 2024 released not long ago showed that LVMH Group's overall sales fell 1% year-on-year to 41.7 billion euros, lower than the 42.2 billion euros generally expected by analysts, while operating profit fell 8% to 10.7 billion euros, and net profit fell 14% to 7.3 billion euros.

At a time when profitability is declining, the benefits of this lucrative sponsorship to the LVMH Group have attracted attention. According to LVMH Group CEO Bernard Arnault, the sponsorship of the Olympics will not have much impact on the group's profits, but LVMH's participation should "enhance the image of the group and its brands." On July 26, LVMH Group's stock price rose by 1.56%, saving the stock price from falling continuously due to the earnings report that was lower than expected.

But for brands, what is more important is how to "spend little money to achieve great things." In terms of Olympic marketing, lululemon is a typical example of a small budget leveraging big exposure. At the Beijing Winter Olympics, lululemon directly turned the opening ceremony into a down jacket promotion conference. After the opening ceremony, lululemon's official website was paralyzed due to a surge in traffic.

Luxury brands have also extended their skillful skills in celebrity endorsements to the field of sports. On the eve of the Paris Olympics, Dior, a subsidiary of the LVMH Group, announced 18 athletes as brand ambassadors, covering fencing, judo, swimming, surfing, football, boxing, skateboarding, sprinting and gymnastics. Chinese table tennis player Chen Meng and swimmer Zhang Yufei became Dior's Chinese brand friends. At the same time, Louis Vuitton also announced four French athletes as brand ambassadors. In May, two tennis legends, Federer and Nadal, rarely appeared in the same frame in the advertising blockbuster shot by Louis Vuitton.

For luxury brands, sports stars have evolved from simply being a platform for brand promotion to gradually becoming a way for brands to attract attention and improve their style during the competition cycle. On this basis, the sports-related luxury goods launched by these brands, through athletes, further strengthen their position in the field of sports fashion.

New Arena

Looking back, the tradition of sports and luxury goods "being in the same frame" is very old. In 1860, Tiffany's founder Charles Louis Tiffany commissioned silversmiths to hand-make trophies. The first work was the Woodlawn Vase made for horse racing events, which is still one of the most expensive sports trophies in the world.

In addition to brands under the LVMH Group, there are also luxury brands that have chosen to cooperate with the Italian delegation. For example, the official uniform partner of the Italian Olympic team is the domestic luxury brand Armani. Armani is also a familiar face in sports events. EA7 under the brand has been a sponsor of the Italian Olympic delegation since the 2012 London Olympics.

In addition, the opening ceremony uniforms of the US Olympic delegation are still designed by the old brand Ralph Lauren. Since 2008, Ralph Lauren has designed the uniforms for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympic Games for the ninth time.

The numerous luxury brands, the dreamlike linkage between fashion and sports have made this Olympics hailed by many viewers as the "most fashionable Olympics in history". The Olympics are held in France, which gives luxury brand sponsorship a natural local advantage. "Luxury brand sponsorship of large-scale sports events also breaks the monopoly of some traditional fast fashion brands. Fashionable and innovative naturally attract more attention," Zhou Ting pointed out.

But it is not enough to just be a status symbol. For luxury brands, the key is whether they can send out effective signals. From the perspective of the sports industry, the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics, with the participation of luxury brands, once again broke the fashion ceiling of sports. It is foreseeable that sports will become the new home of more luxury giants.

Regarding the future marketing trends of luxury brands, Zhou Ting believes that "at present, luxury brand marketing has turned into a new communication trend of content marketing as the main and advertising as the auxiliary, and online marketing as the main and offline as the auxiliary. In addition, the communication of luxury brands is increasingly targeted at high-end customer circles. Precision and efficiency are the marketing goals that all luxury brands are increasingly pursuing."

Beijing Business Daily reporter Lin Yuwei