A YEAR IS A LONG time. Or not – depending on how much you need to get done in 365 days.
As of today, Keith Pelley, the hyper-energetic president of the Canadian broadcast consortium for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games, has but one year left to make ready “the biggest media event in Canadian history,” he says. He and his team have a lot to get done and just one little year to do it.
Hundreds of people are involved in broadcasting (including 140 on-air folks) those 16 days in February of 2010 in Vancouver, Whistler and points in between. A total of 11 TV stations, 10 radio stations, dedicated web sites, and mobile distribution will all ensure that every second of competition and hundreds of hours of highlights and replays are available for viewing.
During a recent interview with Cartt.ca, Pelley literally can’t sit still. The former Toronto Argonauts president and TSN executive (he started there early on as a producer) tosses and spins a football in his hands as he enthuses about what’s done so far and what is still to be done in preparation for the Games’ broadcast.
He dashes around the consortium’s offices on the CTV campus in Agincourt (inside the former Rogers Sportsnet base which still appears like the former tenant only moved out yesterday as there are precious few adornments in the buzzing place full of folks readying the biggest assignments of their careers) showing off the various gems the group has already put together, from the athletes research database to some of the 120-plus Canadian athlete features which will air between now and next February 12th.
“We want to make (the athletes) household names by the time 2010 comes around,” says Pelley. Skiers, skaters, sledders, and many others whose primary following are their own family and a few winter sports aficionados will be well-known to regular Canadians as medal contenders by this time next year, if the promos do their job.
A few limited profiles have been running through the fall and winter (featuring the likes of skeleton competitor Melissa Hollingsworth and skier Jan Hudec – the one whose family escaped the former Czechoslovakia to come to Canada) on TSN and Sportsnet and CTV – but expect an explosion of those from here on in.
And it won’t be just the standard athlete profiles airing on sportscasts (although there are going to be lots of those, too). “Athletes will be talking about what music they like for MuchMusic – or about their fashion interests for FashionTelevision,” explains Pelley.
He and his team want to expand the visibility of the athletes because after all, their stories will be the top stories, pieces of the number one television and media draw for those two weeks. And Pelley wants to be able to package it all to advertisers, no matter what audience those clients want to hit.
“Thirty-three million Canadians will share (the Olympics) through one of our platforms,” notes Pelley. “And we want advertisers to know that not only can we reach everyone, but they can also target and customize their packages like never before through any platform they want – or have complete integration.”
The first partnership deal announced was this week – and McDonald’s is going for complete integration.
However, no Canadian broadcaster, other than the CBC, has aired an Olympics since CTV did Lillehammer, Norway in 1994. Canadian viewers know what to expect from the public broadcaster – and generally, they’ve shown they’re big fans of how the Corp does it, watching in droves every two years.
So there must be some pressure on Pelley, right?
“There will be a tremendous amount of pressure,” he said. But, to mitigate that, he has simply hired the cream of the broadcast crop. “And the people that we were able to attract (to the broadcast consortium) are the best in the business because about a year ago, I spent most of my days just answering the phone with people wanting jobs. Everybody wants to work on the Games, because if you think about it, you know in your career and my career… there will be nothing bigger.”
As an example, Pelley pointed to executive producer of features, Don Young, who was chosen over 110 applicants – and who left his thriving production company that had three network shows in the works – to take his position with the Olympics broadcaster.
But what about “measuring up” to the CBC’s broadcasts, as some have fretted? Pelley says the 2010 Olympics coverage will be like no other has been done in Canada.
“CBC did a very good job. But, if you look at CBC, it was a home and we’re a village,” he explains. “They had a television station with a component on their current web site while we’ve got 11 networks, a dedicated web site, 10 official radio stations, a print partner with the Globe and Mail is part of our team, we have exclusive video streaming rights… It goes on and on and on.
“As far as the scope and the depth of it, this allows for unprecedented consumer choice.
“In fact, there’s a clause in our IOC contract that stipulates if, in fact, a new medium is created from now until September, then the rights automatically revert to the consortium – so, we’ve hired a team of inventors,” he joked.
The consortium will have a pair of studios – one in Vancouver, where indoor events like hockey as well as figure and speed skating are based – and one in Whistler, where we’ll see outdoor events like alpine skiing, luge, and ski jumping.
Turning back to another CTV brand, too, MuchMusic’s flagship show, Much On Demand, will be live for two hours every night in the Whistler Village, “where they’re expecting over 55,000 on a nightly basis,” added Pelley. Celeb cable channel Star! will host its gossip show etalk from the Games, too.
But with two enormous companies in CTV and Rogers – with so much at stake – co-producing this Olympics and the 2012 Games in London, of course we want to know if there’s any friction serving two bosses?
If there is any, Pelley is very, very good at hiding it because he insists there is none. “CTV and Rogers are both incredibly committed to the project,” he said. “We’ve had zero problems.”
It helps that the consortium knows that despite the economy and the very rough go in the ad market right now, the Olympics is always a slam-dunk sale for advertisers. “We have had incredibly positive reaction from the corporate community,” noted Pelley.
So for the next 12 months and 16 days, Pelley expects few days off, if any, as this once-in-a-lifetime project lifts off.
“I don’t want this to end,” he gushed, still flipping that football. “I’ve told everyone the next 12 months will be the busiest of all of our lives… but I keep telling them enjoy it – enjoy it, because it’s not going to come again.”
