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Darren Rovell: First in Thirst: How Gatorade Turned the Science of Sweat into a Cultural Phenomenon
Out in bookstores and online NOW. Published by AMACOM in August 2005.
Darren Rovell & David M. Carter: On the Ball: What You Can Learn About Business From America's Sports Leaders
Published in February 2003 by Financial Times Prentice Hall.
« April 2006 | Main | June 2006 »
About a month ago, I reported that Glaceau's Vitaminwater had signed a slew of athletes in order to relate its product to those who usually chose Gatorade or POWERade on their sports drinking occasions. Here's an early look at their ad with Allen Iverson:
NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson was a big force behind the Gatorade-POWERade tensions in the sport. In 2004, things came to a head when Johnson, a Gatorade endorser, covered up POWERade bottles and a POWERade in Victory Lane after winning a race. Johnson was fined $10,000 for it. So you'd think that Johnson, when asked a question about Gatorade in a NASCAR conference call, would have the right things to say about Gatorade. Well, I'm not sure what he said in his teleconference this week was the best.
Q. This being the longest race of the season, what do you do to get your body ready for a 600-mile race?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, I have the Busch race beforehand, too. I guess it's going to be 900 miles of racing this weekend. I have a physical training regimen I'm on, I go through. The big thing I would say is how important and early I start hydrating for the race. Hydration is going to be the biggest thing for us, for all the drivers in the 600-mile race. Really just drinking the right fluids and drinking lots of them.
Q. Do you drink Gatorade like in the commercial?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: No, Gatorade is a great thing, great product. I just load up between Gatorades and some waters when I need a little something else.
Now, what Johnson is saying here is a little big vague, but I'm pretty sure he's saying that he doesn't use Gatorade's in-car hydration system that was touted in the Matt Kenseth "Origins" Gatorade commercial. This revelation would be interesting because Gatorade just tells us who uses it. We can't actually see NASCAR drivers drinking it like we can see all other athletes drinking Gatorade.
I think that the new Gatorade commercial featuring the heads of Derek Jeter, Peyton Manning, Dwayne Wade and Jenny Finch is cute, but that's about it. It obviously wasn't meant to sell Gatorade by getting a message across. It was one of those "Let's do something to get people talking about Gatorade" commercials. Certainly not a "Let's make sure people know why they need Gatorade spots." Take a look and tell me what you think.
So it's still a little bit hairy as to why Citrus Cooler is back. But I found out a couple more details. Although it's not on the Gatorade.com site, the flavor is available in the southern region of the U.S. --Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. It's mostly in the new 64-ounce bottles, but there are some 32-ouncers. Citrus Cooler can be found at the following supermarkets: BiLo, Brookshire Brothers, Bruno's, Food Lion, Kash N Karry, Harris Teeter, Ingles, Kmart, Kroger, Publix and Winn-Dixie. You can also get Citrus Cooler in a Xtremo vending pack, which includes eight bottles of Mango, eight bottles of Tropical Intenso and eight bottles of Citrus Cooler. I'm not sure why this is a regional thing. It's not like only the southern region of the country can appreciate it.
Comcast, the biggest U.S. cable-television provider, and PepsiCo Inc.'s Gatorade unit signed an advertising agreement on Monday to develop programming. Gatorade will work with Comcast's on-demand Exercisetv to create a series of sports training programs. Gatorade and Propel will become exclusive sponsors of the sports drink and water category for the network. Exercisetv was launched in January as a partnership with exercise guru Jake Steinfeld.
"Consumers increasingly want choice in their media options, as well as convenience and flexibility in their fitness regime, and that's what exercisetv is all about," said Tom Fox, Gatorade's senior vice president of sports marketing said in a news release. "Having access to fitness and sports
training with VOD, along with tips on proper nutrition and hydration from the Gatorade Sports Science Institute, will give the core Gatorade consumer what they want."
The Gatorade/Propel deal includes product placement and branded educational video segments. While I think this deal is noble, I hope for PepsiCo's sake it was cheap. That's because I don't think in your face placement like this works with today's consumers. This is totally different from the much softer, yet much more effective product placement of having athletes on the sidelines drinking Gatorade. That's what Gatorade has done better than any other product in America, not this. Maybe I'm wrong, let's see how this comes off. I haven't watched exercisetv yet, but New Balance already has a deal for this type of product placement with the channel. I'm predicting watchers see this more as propaganda than effective advertising that makes them want to buy the product.
Reader Greg DeSantis reports that he recently picked up some bottles of defunct Gatorade flavor Citrus Cooler in North Carolina. And it couldn't have been an old stash because it's in the new grippable 64 oz. size. I never was a fan of Citrus Cooler, but I've probably never received more mail about a particular flavor. Citrus Cooler debuted in late 80's and when Gatorade signed Michael Jordan, they put his image on bottles of the drink. But, for some reason, it was discontinued. I find the flavor unremarkable and as Greg points out, hardly necessary now that we have a slew of better flavors including Mango (my favorite flavor). I'll try to find out more about why it's back. The drink is still not on the official Gatorade Web site.
Loyal site reader David Evertsen sent me to the new Google Trends page today. It has some pretty interesting information. You can type in a word and it will tell you where in the country or the world people are searching that word. So I obviously typed in "Gatorade." And this is what I found:
1. Caracas, Venezuela, 2. Mexico City, Mexico, 3. Chicago, 4. Philadelphia, 5. Austin, Texas, 6. Miami, 7. Phoenix, 8. Boston, 9. Houston, 10. New York.
I'm not surprised about Mexico City or Chicago, but Caracas, Venezuela, would definitely not be the first city I would think of. Another interesting fact? When I type in POWERade, three Australian cities are in the top 10, and so is Toronto. Gatorade didn't have a presence in either the Land Down Under or Canada.
Mike DeCourcy of The Sporting News gave rave reviews to the new "It's A Whole New Ballgame" Gatorade advertisement. DeCourcy writes: "The Gatorade ad featuring the national team shows some of the difficulties that the players endure for the glory of their game and this nation - particularly the hostile treatment they can receive when playing qualifying games in Latin America. I feel a little weird now, seeing the New England Revolution's Taylor Twellman featured prominently, as he was not included on the 23-man World Cup roster announced last week. But it's still a stirring tribute to a team that faces difficult odds in the Cup's "Group of Death" next month."
As a fellow journalist, I really respect Chuck Klosterman. The guy is a columnist that I really think makes people wonder and laugh. I had a chance to meet Chuck at the Super Bowl when he was working for ESPN.com. We had a couple conversations, but somehow got to the fact that he's a huge Gatorade fan. So i gave him a copy of my "First in Thirst." So I'm flipping though this month's Esquire magazine -- with Tom Hanks on the cover -- and I see that Chuck has written this column absolutely blasting Gatorade Rain. I mean the guy completely smashes it. What was so great about it was you could really tell he wasn't kidding and I loved the passion he brought to the table.
I've seen it with my own two eyes: Athletes drinking Vitaminwater. I know they've done a tremendous job of planting the drink in clubhouses and locker rooms, even though the fact that they have no official status kind of hurts them from a product placement standpoint. Well, now they are taking it to the next level. Glaceau, makers of the product line, has signed a slew of athletes including Brian Urlacher, Tracy McGrady, LaDainian Tomlinson, Ray Lewis, Ray Allen, Allen Iverson and 20 baseball players, including David Ortiz. I think there are some great names here, but I think Glaceau has to be willing to spend plenty on commercials and put athletes on bottles (something Gatorade does not do), to make themselves relevant in this space without official sponsorship deals. There's a little debate going on over their sports drink, which is called perform. It doesn't have salt in it and Gatorade officials point to research that say that it can't be classified as a sports drink if it doesn't seek to replace the most important electrolyte. As a side note, I'm sure the Urlacher signing really stings in Chicago, where Gatorade is of course headquartered.
