London 2012 Watch: Olympics Fever Boosts Smaller Brands, Too

There are fewer than 75 days left before the start of the XXX Olympics in London and sports marketing will no doubt be in the faces of consumers for most of that time and certainly during the Games themselves. But it won’t just be the big-bucks brands sponsoring the events or their big-name ambushing competitors that will be benefiting from the Olympics. 

“You’ve got a month’s worth of free advertising for the sports and sports-related industries,” commented Vincent Mitchell, professor of consumer marketing at Cass Business School in London, to Bloomberg Businessweek. “You’re likely to see gym subscriptions go up, activity-type holidays go up, sports drinks, athletic shoes, it will be a mass effect.”

Even the smallest of sports brands may get a lift from all the sports talk going on as well. For example, a few elite athletes such as cyclist Rebecca Romero and tennis pro Andy Murray have asked the relatively tiny Science in Sport, which was bought by Provexis last summer, to send over its sports gels and other products as they prepare for the main event.

The sports and energy market went up “14 percent to $41.5 billion in 2011 from $36.3 billion in 2010, according to Euromonitor International,” Businessweek reports. So even if Science in Sport can snag a small part of that and  boost its sales a teensy bit from the $8 million it brought in last year, the company would have something to celebrate.

Already, its Facebook page is seeing requests from other athletes for endorsement deals, and the brand just released its first "inspiration film" featuring its sponsored athletes, including the GB Rowing Team, British racing cyclist Michael Hutchinson and the Rapha Condor Sharp Cycling Team.