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Back to the basics Prada’s legacy -- win or lose
Posted: Saturday February 26, 2000 12:37 PM
Joyce Harvey, Special to CNNSI.com AUCKLAND, New Zealand -- Marketing, merchandising and managing an America's Cup campaign is far different today than it was when the event began in 1851. For more than a hundred years, it was the wealthy businessmen who personally financed their dreamboats to claim world bragging rights to the best, brightest and fastest yachts afloat, but things have changed -- or have they? Today, anything even remotely affiliated to America's Cup is awash with corporate logos in a relentless bombardment of advertising. A photographer here couldn't find a camera angle without a colorful splash of at least a half dozen corporate logos if his job depended on it -- and that is the point. But multiple corporate sponsorship is a necessary nuisance to fund campaigns for all the syndicates -- except one. Patrizio Bertelli has taken his America's Cup campaign back to the beginning and back to basics. Prada stands out with its simple, tasteful and understated graphics. Bertelli, is the head of the Italian fashion house Prada and is the sole backer of the $55-million dollar campaign, but says he does not use his campaign to enhance or promote the Prada. "We didn't participate because we wanted to show or enhance the brand," says Bertelli. But he does admit there has been a substantial return on that investment in brand exposure but declines to put a dollar figure on it. Every syndicate would gladly choose the Prada single sponsorship method but it simply was never an option. Today syndicates often spend more time and energy raising money than building their team and their yachts. They will do whatever it takes.
Team New Zealand syndicate head, Peter Blake started selling a "lucky red socks" for the 1995 America's Cup challenge to help raise funds for new sails. The extraordinarily successful campaign is still going strong. Red socks are now a staple of practically every man, woman and child's wardrobe in New Zealand. Dennis Conner even resorted to auctioning off a crew position on Stars and Stripes for one race day in the semifinals for nearly $100,000. It is a merchandizing bonanza for the other challengers, not by choice but by necessity. Many syndicates opened stores at their compound headquarters along the America's Cup Village to capitalize on every moneymaking possibility. Even teams that have been long eliminated still have their stores up and running. No merchandising opportunity can be overlooked. Stars and Stripes was eliminated in the semifinals but the team store still does a brisk business and it now sells a T-shirt showing a Kiwi bird eating a plate of Italian pasta. There is not a T-shirt, hat or souvenir of any kind to be found with the name Prada on it for sale, much to the disappointment of many of the team's supporters. Only the crew and staff wear clothes or hats sporting the name. Bertelli believes this helps build team moral. Every competitor and those with an eye on the Cup for the future hope Prada's sponsorship method will be seen, heard and adopted by other corporations thus allowing teams to focus on the sailing and not the soliciting. Bertelli himself hopes this is the start of positive changes. "In the next America's Cup we might see new players who might understand there is a different way of sponsoring the America's Cup and being more involved," he says. In response to the criticism that America's Cup yachts are simply multi-million dollar billboards -- well, yes they are -- but maybe Prada's example and success will motivate other corporate sponsors to follow, which in turn will increase participation and be an enormous benefit to a great sport.
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