Red Bull and Sports Marketing
Red Bull is a very successful energy drink that is sold all around the world. The company has benefited from a very interesting marketing technique that uses sports marketing. The company has a very different strategy to other companies that sponsor sporting events. Unlike other companies that will sponsor a certain event or a few players, Red Bull likes to take ownership of the marketing and sponsors of an entire team or an entire event. This can be seen in the sponsorship of an entire Formula 1 racing team, an entire football team in the MLS and the sponsoring of an entire air racing event. In the future Red Bull looks all set to increase its presence in sports marketing all over the world.
Red Bull is an Austrian energy drinks company that was founded by Austrian businessman and entrepreneur Dietrich Mateschitz in 1987. It is actually a partnership between a Thai company that produced tonic drinks in Thailand and an Austrian company called Red Bull GmbH. After it was launched in Austria in 1987, the product’s sales literally exploded in the niche market that it operated in. Red Bull is available in 120 countries around the world today and has sales in excess of 3 billion cans a year. In 2004 the company was worth $2 billion and is probably worth much more today but because Red Bull does not reveal its financial data we cannot be sure. The market that the company operates in is targeted towards 16-29 year old men who are young, hip and live in an urban setting. This target market niche gives it the avenue into extreme sports and sports marketing that the company pursues aggressively.
From almost the start of the brand, Red Bull has been associated with non traditional sporting events. The target market that drinks the company’s product is interested in extreme sports and a non traditional lifestyle. So it was through this avenue that the company started to push the boundaries of sports marketing that had been previously explored by a company. At the moment a conservative estimate brings up the following sports that the brand is associated with; Rugby Union, Downhill Mountain Bike Racing, BMX, Snowboarding, Kite Surfing, Skate Boarding, BASE Jumping, Soccer, Athletics, Wake Boarding, Formula 1, Air Racing, NASCAR, Surfing, Rallying, Para Gliding, Music, Dance and many more. This huge array of sports just shows the extent to which Red Bull is entrenched in the sports market of today. The number of these sports is all set to increase in the coming years.
Red Bull took a very different approach to sports marketing by sponsoring entire teams and events. They take a unique look at what sports and brands can do together. They bought an entire Formula 1 team and an entire football team in the MLS. Red Bull racing in F1 has been very successful with its drivers Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel doing really well in this year’s championship. The New York Red Bull football team in the MLS has recently signed Thierry Henry and looks all set to light the MLS on fire. The company estimates that it spends almost $300 million a year of its marketing budget to sponsor sports teams and events. That is a huge amount of money to spend on sporting events by a company. It just shows how aggressively Red Bull is targeting the segment of the market that it currently owns. This segment has come under pressure recently with the involvement of the big guns of the drinks world Coca-Cola and Pepsi. They have also introduced or bought energy drinks companies and are making serious inroads into the market. Red Bull will probably have to increase their sports presence to increase the visual impact on their target market.
Not everyone is happy with the company though. A few sports purists wish that big brands would limit their sponsorship of teams and events to only sponsoring players or giving money to help teams along. They are opposed to the overarching presence of a company that owns an entire team. It seems as if the world of sport and the beautiful games are being tainted by big brand money and they are becoming too commercialised and losing their artistic aspect. It seems that the sports and the players are being forgotten but we are being force fed brands and made to focus more on companies than on the games.
Whichever way it is looked at Red Bull’s dominance on the sports marketing field is all set to grow and they will be looking at owning more teams and more events in the future. By taking a unique line of sports marketing, the company is pioneering itself into the minds of its consumers and also into the minds of sports fans all over the world.
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