Where is the love?

Two years ago on July 6th London won the opportunity to host the Olympic Games in 2012. It was a great day, the country was on a high, and it was the first time for quite a long time that the UK had a sense of togetherness. The next day was a dark day, with the worst terrorist attack on our shores for a long time if not ever. That day highlighted that perhaps we weren’t as together as we perhaps thought we were, as British people had attacked other British people.

The mass negativity about the new London 2012 branding/logo has upset me slightly; it reminded me of above and got me thinking that perhaps major problems lie in the British psyche. Admittedly the branding experts at Wolff Olins could have perhaps have done a better job for London 2012, but why do we always knock down anything that we once held dear to our hearts? There are hundreds of such examples, too many to list here. Regarding the logo however, I understand that people don’t care much for it but there is obviously a bigger anti-London 2012 feeling around. If it simply falls down to money, we should be doing our homework a bit more because the games will not be as costly to the UK public as the papers are promoting – a lot of it is coming from private finance, including the money raised for the branding exercise. 

The media, in my opinion should take a lot of the blame; effectively we’ve seen hardly any praise for the 2012 games for a long time. Is this fully representative of the public views? I’m sure the majority of people are currently displeased but what about the large group of people that have kept the faith? These people deserve a voice and ultimately if the media was a bit more positive about things then perhaps the general public won’t think things are so bleak after all. In my opinion cynical journalism is like cynical anything, it’s the easy way out.

So, what next for the games? Well it needs to rediscover the magic that it once had and it really can’t do this by old school PR spin. Engagement and discussion directly with the public (advocates especially) will claw the credibility back. The Beijing games should help too. The games will be a success and loved by all, we just need the public to look beyond the logo and believe in it.