Dive Brief:
- Honda is drawing parallels between high-performance athletes and engineering ingenuity for its first campaign as the official automotive partner of Team USA, according to a press release.
- “This is The Power of Dreams” is anchored around 10 Olympic and Paralympic athlete ambassadors, flipping between them playing their respective sports and Honda building and testing its vehicles. The campaign is led by two 60-second TV spots, with the creative set to premiere during NBC’s Opening Ceremony.
- The effort is designed to be modular, allowing Honda to mix and match creative assets for different channels and incorporate same-day footage into certain TV ads. The brand will also enact Roku takeovers during key Team USA hockey games and deploy first-arrival ads on Peacock for men’s hockey programming.
Dive Insight:
Honda’s debut campaign as the official automotive partner of Team USA weds elite athleticism with vehicular innovation. The brand is getting more mileage out of its creative through what it described as a modular strategy that will see it mix and match footage of athlete ambassadors, Honda engineers and products based on the needs of different media channels and verticals.
The modular approach, which Honda said is exclusive to Olympic rings-holder sponsors, will also allow the brand to use same-day footage of Team USA athletes competing in select cuts of its TV spots, giving the commercials more real-time relevance and the chance to showcase highlights from the Winter Games in Milano Cortina.
Honda’s two lead spots, “Ideas Into Action” and “A Flawless Performance,” will appear in 60-, 30-, 15- and 6-second cutdowns across broadcast, streaming and digital platforms for the duration of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. In addition, the automaker is promoting the campaign during nationally broadcast NBA and NHL programming and the NFL’s AFC and NFC championship matchups on Jan. 25. On its social channels, Honda will spotlight the individual stories of athletes included in “This is The Power of Dreams” and tap into “fun social trends,” per the release.
Honda’s Team USA athlete ambassadors are: ice hockey player Kendall Coyne Schofield; para alpine skier Audrey Crowley; sled hockey players Declan Farmer and Brody Roybal; figure skaters Ilia Malinin, Madison Chock and Evan Bates; speedskater Jordan Stolz; para snowboarder Brenna Huckaby and bobsledder Kaysha Love. The campaign also features two Team Honda drivers, Kyle Kirkwood and Dai Yoshihara, and vehicle offerings such as the Honda Prelude hybrid, Honda Passport TrailSport and yet-to-be-released Honda 0 Series Saloon electric-vehicle model.
“This is The Power of Dreams” has separate creative running for Honda’s Powersports, Power Equipment and Marine product lines, as well. The campaign expands Honda’s work around the Olympics, with the marketer having a nearly two-decade partnership with USA Hockey and its Acura brand serving as a sponsor of the USA Bobsled and Skeleton teams through the 2030 Winter Olympic Games. Honda is also among the first naming-rights partners of the LA28 Olympics.
