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With the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games only weeks away, McDonald’s Canada Olympic marketing machine is in top gear, launching its latest TV ad, the sixth of seven created for the Games.
The latest 30-second spot features Olympic speed skater Cindy Klassen sitting in an airport waiting for her flight when a young girl sits beside her and explains she too is going to the Olympics.
The girl excitedly explains she’s one of 300 employees selected under the McDonald’s Olympic Champion Crew program to serve athletes, coaches and media at one of three on-site restaurants.
“It’s going to be amazing,” she tells Klassen. “And you’re going to be doing that speed skating thing, right? That will be fun, too.”
The spot ends with the tag line, “Now that’s golden.”
The effort is built on the “golden” platform that helps consumers relate the Olympics to the gold standard of quality consumers have come to expect from the quick service chain, said Hope Bagozzi, director of national marketing at McDonald’s Canada.
“The gold standard in anything is the best of the best,” she said.
During the 17-day event, McDonald’s will debut its final 30-second brand spot that focuses on the general spirit of the Games, she said.
Also running during the Games: a series of billboards in the Vancouver area that use McDonald’s meal items as landscapes. For instance, one execution shows boarders on “Fry Mountain.”
Cossette developed the creative, and OMD handled the media buy.
Restaurants will be adorned with Olympic design elements featuring Canadian athletes like snowboarders Brad Martin and Crispin Lipscomb, as well as freestyle skier Alexandre Bilodeau and former Olympian Cassie Campbell, who were also recently featured in TV spots.
Locations now feature exterior merchandising including building wraps, Olympic medals hanging from the golden arches, branded boards and Olympian cutouts that sit on the roof.
Hundreds of locations nationwide have been revamped to include flat screen TVs that will broadcast the Games, said Louis Payette, national media relations manager for McDonald’s Canada.
“We really want to be the hub where people can go and grab a bite and cheer on their favourite Olympians,” he said.
McDonald’s has been an official Olympic sponsor since 1976, and has activated Olympic-themed promotions over the last year like the launch of its themed water bottle collectibles, and its 2010 Hopefuls program.
Olympic Mascot toys will be available with the purchase of a Happy Meals, starting in February.
