Olympics construction PR #Fail? #BLD2012
It’s Olympic year and anyone with the slightest connection with the London Games is looking forward to the big event and hoping to gain out of it too. And why not? As well as sport, it is a chance to celebrate what’s great about the UK’s built environment sector. But wait, from what Peter Murray has said in The Times it is not that easy.
In fact it strikes as a bit of a PR Olympics Fail (to use the language of Twitter) by the Olympic Delivery Authority. Murray, who is the chairman of New London Architecture (NLA), warned in a letter to the Times on Tuesday (3 January) that construction firms involved in the London Olympics were being prevented from capitalising on the success of the project by the Olympic Delivery Authority’s draconian publicity rules.
Construction firms involved in 2012 projects have to abide by the London 2012 No Marketing Rights Protocol, which prohibits most marketing activity capitalising on the Games. That covers facilities management firms as well. I know this because at least two decent editorial ideas I’ve tried to move forward have been foiled in this way.
Murray wrote: “The wider commercial benefits to business will only occur if the architects, engineers, contractors and suppliers who helped deliver this success are able to shout about it to the world. The Olympic Delivery Authority did a brilliant job in completing the park at Stratford ahead of schedule. It now behoves the London 2012 Organising Committee (Locog) to ease up on its restrictions and allow those firms which have served them so well to garner some credit.”
He has got an excellent point. I’d imagine that the communications team at the ODA must be very nervous about the comments on Twitter and the push to champion what UK construction and FM firms have achieved led by Building magazine #BLD2012. There must be ways around the rules, but Murray has picked up on something that needs changing if firms, individuals and also communities are going to benefit from the London Games.
If there is one decent New Year resolution it is to throw the Locog publicity rules in to the River Lea.
Tags: #Fail, construction, Olympics, Peter Murray, PR