Olympic mascot choice complicates supply

An unprecedented five mascots for the 2008 Olympics may make it harder for companies, already burdened with regulations from local organizers, to supply merchandise for the Beijing Games."The mascot concept is good but the number is a big issue," Devin Kao, who has the license to produce Olympic pins and key chains, said in an interview in Beijing. "Five is a little bit complicated."The "five friendlies," a fish, a panda, a swallow, an antelope and a flame, were unveiled in a ceremony Friday to mark the 1,000-day countdown to the Games. Increasing the number of Olympic mascots - Salt Lake City and Sydney had three - means that manufacturers must design more production molds and coordinate different sales strategies.Mascot memorabilia, from pins to soft toys, arrived in Chinese stores over the weekend. The Beijing Organizing Committee for the games approves product designs and sets prices.Under his contract, Kao said his company's name could not be revealed in the media, even though the U.S.-based group has held Olympic licenses since 1996. The company is one of four that are licensed to distribute products in China. None can be exported for now.The Beijing organizers are "extremely professional" and have a "very high level of perfection," Hein Verbruggen, the International Olympic Committee official overseeing preparations for the 2008 Games, said in an interview.Olympic mascots, first seen at the 1968 Winter Games in Grenoble, have a mixed record, according to Ed Hula, whose aroundtherings.com news service has tracked the Olympics for 13 years."If they're a bad mascot, they're a constant source of ridicule and satire; if good, they're a comfortable part of the image," Hula said. "I've never known any of them to be huge moneymakers."Jumbo, a Greek toy retailer and Olympic licensee, said it had sold about 11 million, or $12.9 million, of Athens 2004 merchandising, most featuring the giant-footed cartoon characters Phevos and Athena. In Athens this week, shops offered 50 percent discounts for mascot-laden T-shirts, toys and key chains.The Beijing organizers' marketing campaigns, and the opening of about 200 Olympic stores in China this week, will help drive sales, Kao said. Chinese people were enthusiastic about the Olympic emblem when it was first made public in August 2004."People stood in lines and they don't just buy one or two, they buy the whole set," Kao said.Amid heightened secrecy over the mascots before last week's announcement, Kao said the organizing committee told him to truck the 100,000 pins and 5,000 sets of bookmarks from his Shanghai factory rather than fly them.That reduced the chance of the goods showing up in metal detectors - possibly revealing the identity of Beibei the fish, Huanhuan the flame, Yingying the antelope, Jingjing the panda and Nini the swallow."There's a lot of hype when mascots are launched as a milestone and some indication for what the Games will be," Hula said. "Then the interest dissipates pretty quickly afterwards."