Which industries do consumers think are best suited to sponsor their country’s Olympics teams?
As the Olympic Games Paris 2024 gets underway, it’s a chance to sparkle and win big – not just for athletes but also for brands aligned with the event and participating teams. But which brands have the best chance of striking a chord with consumers? One aspect of this multi-faceted question is to look at the types of brands that consumers consider suitable for sponsorship of participant teams.
A new YouGov Surveys poll does exactly this, asking consumers in 17 diverse markets about the types of brands they regard as being most appropriate for sponsorships of their nation’s Olympics team.
Italians and Brits are the most likely among Europeans to give travel brands the thumbs up for Olympics sponsorship.
Well over half of Italians (58%) and Britons (57%) say travel and tourism brands make for appropriate sponsors of their respective Olympics teams. On the other hand, Poles are less than half as likely to say the same (27%).
Poles instead are far more likely to see auto-makers as appropriate Olympics sponsors (46%) compared to only a quarter of Britons (25%). Germany (39%) and Italy (37%) – two markets with world-renowned car manufacturing industries – have fairly high approval for the sector but are matched or slightly surpassed by rates seen in Denmark (40%) and Sweden (40%).
Tech brands have relatively even support across markets – ranging from 31% in Denmark to a high of 45% among Brits. This isn’t the case with retail, for which Brits (49%) log three times the rate as consumers in France (15%) and Italy (14%).
Gambling tends to have relatively low support across the board, but host market of France is an exception (21%).
In North America, Canadians and Mexicans are markedly more welcoming of finance companies as sponsors of their Olympics teams than Americans.
Nearly half of US’ northern (48%) and southern (46%) neighbors give their approval to banks and insurance brands, compared to just a third of them (32%).
Fast food brands rate very highly (relative to other markets) in the US (32%) and Canada (31%), but drop slightly among Mexicans (23%).
Canadians (21%), meanwhile, are twice as likely as Mexicans (11%) to give the go ahead to oil and gas companies as sponsors.
Retail – a fairly popular category in both the US (46%) and Canada (39%) – drops precipitously among consumers in Mexico (12%).
Mexicans (18%) are nearly three times as likely as Americans (6%) to approve of gambling companies as Olympics sponsors.
Over half of Indonesians (52%) and Hong Kong consumers (53%) approve of tech sponsorship of their Olympics teams, leading the way in the APAC/UAE bloc.
Approval for tech brands is high across the board with the exception of UAE, where a third of consumers (34%) give the thumbs up.
Australians (63%) are the most likely, not just in this bloc, but among all 17 markets to deem travel brands a good fit for Olympics sponsorship. Rates in India (53%) and Singapore (53%) are also fairly high for this category.
Pharma is among the categories that reflects the diversity you’d expect of such a wide range of markets. Only 16% of Indonesians approve of sponsors from this category, but the share is doubled in markets like Hong Kong (33%) and India (31%).
There is a lot of variance in perceived suitability of oil and gas sponsors too, with a third of Indians (33%) and UAE consumers (32%) giving the nod, compared to 14% of Australians and 17% of Singapore consumers.
Needless to say, variances exist even within markets based on key demographics such as gender and age. For further slices of regional or demographic analyses, you can reach out to us by clicking on the button below.
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Methodology: YouGov Surveys: Serviced provide quick survey results from nationally representative or targeted audiences in multiple markets. The data is based on surveys of adults aged 18+ years in 17 markets with sample sizes varying between 445 and 1629 for each market. All surveys were conducted online in May 2024. Data from each market uses a nationally representative sample apart from Mexico and India, which use urban representative samples, and Indonesia and Hong Kong, which use online representative samples. Learn more about YouGov Surveys: Serviced.