Seen a Tiger Woods ad on the telly in the last ten days? Didn’t think so. According to Bloomberg, marketers have seemingly been treating the world’s number one golfer like Ebola ever since his accident and indiscretions came to light. Not only has Gatorade dropped “Tiger Focus” (which they now say was already planned two days before the accident), but Woods’ more notable sponsors like Gillette haven’t run one of those “Champions” spots since November 29.
Gillette, though, tells Bloomberg that the media schedule is running as planned and no Tiger ads have been pulled–though they wouldn’t comment on the frequency. Nike’s golf division, meanwhile, says it isn’t diverting its ad plans while EA probably has been MIA since there’s no campaign centered on Woods to run as of late. Regardless, Carat’s director of media investments Andy Donchin tells the trade that sponsors will “attempt to limit his face time.”
Seeing as his celebrity endorser ranking has dropped from 6th to 24th according to measurement tool the Davie Brown Index, we’re wondering how much impact this will have exactly on Tiger’s reported $110M in annual income from endorsements. As AdAge said earlier this week, Woods’ actions have essentially helped give sponsors all the leverage now. At least he can take solace in quadrupling traffic to Golf.com.