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It took two weeks, but sponsors finally started distancing themselves from the suddenly embattled Tiger Woods. Once the squeaky-clean poster boy for all that was right with sports, Woods needed only a fortnight to destroy an image that took more than a decade to build. Accenture has ended its six-year relationship with Woods because he was "no longer the right representative for its advertising." And Gillette has phased Woods out of its advertisements until he gets his personal life in order and returns to golf.
But Nike, the company that has been with Tiger since he turned pro in 1996, is still firmly behind the most recognizable face on the planet. Chairman Phil Knight told Sports Business Journal that he believed the media firestorm surrounding Woods would eventually pass.
"I think he has been really great," Knight said. "When his career is over, you'll look back on these indiscretions as a minor blip, but the media is making a big deal out of it right now." ... Knight called the admitted infidelity by Woods "part of the game" in the industry of endorsements and said when it comes to building brands around athletes, 'There is always a risk.'Knight added: "Obviously, he was one we checked out and he came out clean."
"One of the things we always try to do when we have a big endorsement is check out the character and the pattern of the individual, but you're not going to get it right all the time, and if you're going to be in the business you have to recognize that."
Will Tiger's image repair itself over time, though? Will the fact that he is again dominating golf be enough to overcome the previous two weeks? History says so: Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley are examples that immediately come to mind. But as the New Yorker's James Surowiecki writes, corporations forking over eight- and nine-figure endorsement deals aren't interested in waiting around to find out. And more than that, all scandals aren't created equal.
Unlike [Arnold] Palmer or Jordan, Woods never seemed warm or even especially personable. Instead, he seemed resolutely businesslike. Woods' appeal was based, ultimately, not on his physical abilities but on his mental toughness, his extraordinary capacity for focus and discipline. He was the man who always made the key putt, who never cracked under pressure. ...In terms of what this means for Tiger's marketability going forward, Surowiecki adds:
Woods has been presented as the embodiment of bourgeois virtues: dedication, hard work, single-mindedness. ... For millions of people -- many of them, to be sure, affluent middle-aged white guys -- Woods embodied an approach not just to golf but to life. ...
The current scandal has disrupted, if not shattered, this image of perfect control.
"Scandals that aren't out of tune with a celebrity's image are often surprisingly easy to bounce back from: after images of Kate Moss snorting coke surfaced, her bookings fell, but, over time, they went up. Revelations that Michael Jordan had lost hundreds of thousands of dollars gambling barely dented his appeal, since the story reinforced the image of him as a fierce competitor. But scandals that conflict with a person's public image can wreak havoc. And it's hard to think of a scandal that's more discordant with an image of focus and discipline than this one."
So despite conventional wisdom, Tiger Woods, as we knew him prior to Thanksgiving, may never be the same.
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