Current Issues in Marketing Strategy

The Red Bull Air Race is a minority sport which is hugely expensive, difficult to derive income from and falls under the banner of "corporate branding", but is it delivering any real value to the company? Purely taking a marketing strategy point of view their are two schools of thought, firstly that sports branding is nearly pointless and alternatively that you can 'associate' your brand with the sporting attributes (e.g David Jones & Melbourne Cup fashion). The Red Bull Air Race fits into neither of these directly, the strategy in relation to competitors is brilliant.


What would you say if I offered you, an event that people would not only associate your brand with, but your brand would actually transcend product boundaries and become part of the name? I also offer you unlimited branding, 100% creative rights and it represent your brand values of cool and premium? Would that be worth your advertising spend?

Contrast this to one of the sponsors of the Australian Open or America's Cup, many marketers I know claim this sort of spending buys nothing more than corporate entertainment. With this in mind, you can see why Red Bull sink so much folding stuff (money) into what is effectively a nothing sport.

Branding is Red Bull's point of differentiation. You will be hard pressed to find a more disciplined branding across any number of product categories, 'subtle premium' + 'young & cool'. They have worked very hard over the years to build their brand and now with competitors like Mother, Rockstar and enough pretenders to make the Foo fighters write a sequel song (follow the reference if you can) entering the market, this branding insulates the market leader from a price war and helps to maintain their market share without competition.

Josh Strawczynski's Opinion:
I love the air race, unlike Rockstar that has invested money in sponsoring some back water motor sport or any number of other energy drinks that max out their advertising spend in this way, Red Bull have a strategy keeping them miles in front.

Sam Berringer's Opinion:
There is room in the energy drink market for more players, but they need to find a point of differentiation. At the moment everyone is trying to create the same product. I asked a barmaid why she was drinking Mother and she said "because it tastes like Red Bull"...why? That is like selling an Ipod with the label scratched out and 'Sam's Music' stick slapped over the top...it's not fooling anyone!