Cerveza Tecate To Produce Sports Awards Program

by Karl Greenberg, May 23, 2008, 5:00 AM

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Cerveza Tecate is producing--and is lead sponsor of--a new televised sports awards program to be broadcast on top Spanish-language network Univision. The show, "Tecate Premios Deportes," will air on July 20. It will be taped before an audience at Pasadena (Calif.) Auditorium. Fourteen hundred seats will be made available to the public, with ticket sale details to be announced at a later date.

The show, featuring performances, honorary awards presentations and a pantheon of Hispanic entertainers, will comprise awards in categories like North American Soccer, Hispanic Boxer, Baseball Hispanic All-StarTeam, Basketball Hispanic Player of the year, and American Football Hispanic Player of the year.

There will also be Tecate Male and Female Athletes of the Year awards, which are among honors for which consumers can vote online through Univision.com.

Carlos Boughton, brand director of Tecate Brand Equity for distributor Heineken USA, says the program came as happenstance during a marketing roundtable with Univision. "It was one of those things where you are having conversation and someone has an idea, you talk about it, and the rest of the people get excited about it. The idea just came to life; nobody had done anything like this," he says. "There are a bunch of [Latin American] awards for entertainment and music, but not specifically for sports."

He says that the company--and Univision--are expecting the show to garner between a 10 and 12 rating. "It will be on Saturday, a really good schedule, so we feel that it has potential to be a huge, huge audience."

Tecate will support the program with radio, TV, print and out-of-home ads as well as special packaging of Cerveza Tecate.

On hand to judge are sports writers and athletes like Oscar de la Hoya, popular Mexican ex-soccer goalie Jorge Campos, ex-football great Tony Casillas, NFL Hall of Fame Recipient Anthony Muñoz, former Mexican soccer coach Jesus Bracamontes, and Enrique Borja, president of the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León. UANL, or simply Tigres, is a popular Mexican professional football club.

Boughton says about three-quarters of Tecate consumers are Hispanic. In Los Angeles, Tecate is now the No. 3 beer brand, and the second-largest beer brand among Hispanics, whose first choice is Bud Light.

Beyond the Univision program, Tecate has several sports sponsorships tied up. The company, which has a marketing arrangement with Oscar de la Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions, was recently lead sponsor of the fighter's L.A. bout versus Steve Forbes, and Boughton says Tecate will also be sponsor of the near-certain upcoming redux of de la Hoya versus Floyd Mayweather, Jr., tentatively slotted for this fall. Tecate brand signage will be on the ring turnbuckle pads, per Boughton who says the deal is still being worked out.

"And we will have two or three fights of large caliber and are also confirming details around five professional soccer matches in July involving Mexican teams and Mexican-American teams," he says.

Heineken USA began marketing Tecate in the U.S. in 2004 when Heineken USA inked a deal with Tecate owner FEMSA Cerveza that made Heineken sole and exclusive importer, marketer and seller in the U.S. market of FEMSA's beer brands Dos Equis, Tecate, Sol, Carta Blanca, Bohemia and Tecate Light. Last April, the companies signed a 10-year contract finalizing the arrangement.

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