• by Karl Greenberg , November 11, 2008

Coca-Cola North America has signed a deal with Mexican football goalkeeper Francisco Guillermo "Memo" Ochoa. As official Coca-Cola spokesperson, Ochoa will make customer appearances, do autograph signings, and participate in meet and greets with U.S. fans.

"We're proud to partner with a tremendous athlete like Memo, who inspires fans to dream big and live positively," said Reinaldo Padua, assistant vice president, Hispanic Marketing, Coca-Cola North America. "As an official sponsor of the MNT, Coca-Cola continues to enhance its initiatives to bring the excitement of soccer to Hispanic communities throughout the U.S."

Coca-Cola has been one of the major partners of the Mexican National Team for 30 years, and expanded the marketing relationship to the U.S. in 2003.

The company has run several Hispanic market campaigns recently. Last year, the Atlanta company launched the "The Coca-Cola Telenovela Club" that allowed consumers to apply My Coke Rewards points to prizes related to five top telenovelas: "Corazon Salvaje," "La Madrastra," "Rubi," "Amor Real" and "Alborada."

For the past two years, the company has marketed an SKU of its Full Throttle energy drink, Blue Demon, explicitly to Latino men 20 to 30 years of age. The company says the blue agave-flavored Blue Demon version of Full Throttle has nearly doubled in volume from the company executives' original projections.

This year the company hired Padua, former executive with Atlanta-based consultancy the Zyman Group, to be Coke's North American AVP/Hispanic Marketing.

For four years, it has run a Hispanic retail program called Tienda. With the program, Coke provides marketing, promotional support and sales support to Hispanic businesses that redesign their stores.

Coke says some 5,000 small businesses have joined from 15 markets with a strong Latin presence, including Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and New York.