Yohan Blake’s Watch Has Officially Gone Viral; Controversy Ensues

SHOP: Tourbillon Pens | Tourbillon Cufflinks

BROWSE 2013: Dive Watches

BASELWORLD 2013: See our ongoing live coverage here >>>

Yohan Blake’s Watch Has Officially Gone Viral; Controversy Ensues
by Kyle Stults on August 09, 2012

The shrewd marketing move by Richard Mille may be backfiring, at least for his athlete-Ambassador. Reports everywhere today note that the International Olympic Committe (IOC) is not happy about the ultra-light “product placement” on Yohan Blake’s wrist. Violation of rule 40, Bylaw 2 of the Olympic Charter. It all seems completely absurd to me, but that’s how these things go. You gotta pay to play.

No doubt that Richard Mille knew they were taking some measure of risk that this could happen. My guess is that they never in a million years though that Yohan Blake’s watch would go viral (though maybe they hoped so). Now we have to hear from people everywhere opining about a watch they know nothing about and how “stupid” and “overpriced” it is, etc. — but everyone’s entitled to their opinion. Too bad to see Blake become embroiled in controversy. As for Mille, this is probably good a thing — free publicity on a grand scale!

You can check out our various reporting on Richard Mille on his ultra-light, sport-ready watches worn by famous athletes here:

YOHAN BLAKE

RAFAEL NADAL

BUBBA WATSON

http://www.ticktocking.com Steve Hallock

I don’t see how that’s backfiring – seems like the whole point!!
- http://www.perpetuelle.com/ Perpetuelle
  
  @stevehallock:disqus Agreed the “backfire” is really for Yohan Blake as he may face the penalties of the IOC. As for Mille, yea — grand PR!!!
Orville Powell

Jamaica was abuzz with excitement, the crowd were chanting 1-2-3 after the race. The whole issue with the watch just filtering to the main populace but the whole country focusing on the race and the 4x100m next.
- http://www.perpetuelle.com/ Perpetuelle
  
  Hi @d3a5c2af92e349b6116c57d1ea5bb45f:disqus thanks again for commenting. Congrats again.
Pingback: Yohan Blake Wears Richard Mille Wristwatch At London Olympics | Perpetuelle
Pingback: JEUX AOÛT-LYMPIQUES : Apparemment, Omega a (presque) fait le ménage dans le 200 m | Business Montres
http://www.crownandcaliber.com/ Crown & Caliber

That publicity isn’t “free” – I’m thinking there will be a very substantial fine! Hopefully, Richard Mille will cover any fines Blake gets hit with, although ANOTHER Jamaican sprinter (Warren Weir) raced with what appeared to be a G-Shock last night.

The only watches Olympians are allowed to wear are OMEGA watches to my understanding (side note- if that’s true – how in the world would they afford them?), so it would be extremely interesting to know if Blake and Warren Weir get hit with a flat rate fine, or if Blake will receive a bigger one for what was a PR stunt. As another one of your commenters stated, the Jamaicans were into the RM Blake wore – maybe Weir just wanted to join in and e cool, too?
- http://www.perpetuelle.com/ Perpetuelle
  
  We agree to disagree. Time will tell what the fine may be, but I’d guess that any fine (on Blake, not Mille) will be trivial compared to the massive amounts of publicity this has gotten Richard Mille.
  
  Watch any 5 minute segment of the Olympics and you will see the athletes wearing all sorts of watches — Nike, Timex, Casio and more.
  It’s all a bogus deal — Omega “official timekeeper” was not happy about their spotlight being stolen by another high-end brand and they had the power to make some noise about it.
goju1

Obviously no problem for RM – as noted in the blogpost.
For future ‘ambassadors’ though, they might have to insist on ownership of the watch (either free or at a supreme discount) to avoid such problems.
However, if the IOC would not make a fuss then most likely no-one except the small group of watch lovers would ever have been aware of it. Let’s face it, who in the world, apart from watch aficionados, would have even heard of Richard Mille or recognise one of his watches – or even care if they did!
It could have been completely overlooked – therefore one wonders if RM made sure that it wasn’t.
Pingback: Yohan Blake and Richard Mille at London 2012 Olympic Games | TheWatchPress.com
Pingback: Rafael Nadal – The Tennis Player | Trend Feed
Pingback: Richard Mille RM 59-01 ‘Yohan Blake’ Tourbillon | Perpetuelle
Pingback: Richard Mille Unveils ‘Yohan Blake’ Tourbillon RM 59-01 watch - Team Jamaica