The history of the Olympia cigarettes, smoking to finance the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games

Leather bags.Pines.Balloons.Caps.Stamps.And even ... cigarettes.When we had to finance the Tokyo Olympic Games from 1964, the first edition of the event on the Asian continent, before those taking place from July 23 to August 8 in the Japanese capital, the organizers did not skimp on thederivative products and other licenses to bring money into the boxes.Even if it means massively marketing a product that comes into frontal contradiction with the values of Olympism.Remember: "The healthy mind in a healthy body", including lungs.The Olympia cigarettes will report more than a million dollars in total, a plump sum for the time, which made it one of the most profitable products in the 1964 vintage. Back on a success story.

Seeking sources of funding desperately

"When Japan obtained the Games in 1958, it was the first time that the country had the opportunity to show itself in a new light since the end of the Second World War," contextualizes Markus Osterwalder, specialist in the History of the games and incidentally holding one of the most imposing collections linked to the Flubie de Pierre de Coubertin (60,000 objects, distributed in three buildings, excuse the little - article in German). The sorrowful spirits will nitle and recall, like the investigative journalist Andrew Jennings (in his book The New Lords of the Rings, 1996) that the best call-girls in the city were not for nothing in the very favorable appreciation CIO delegates. Nevertheless. For the Japanese capital, the challenge is immense. Less than twenty years after being practically striking the card, Tokyo invests massively in game -related infrastructure. An airport, four air highways, 70 km of roads, 8 km of monorail, not to mention the stadiums, for a budget estimated at $ 72 million, a pharaonic total for the time (around $ 600 million today ).

If a balanced budget is not possible, the local organizing committee deploys energy treasures to affix the Olympic rings on all products.Starting with the Peace Cigarette brand, which in 1960 declines the logo on a collection of around thirty packaging, each representing one of the sports in competition during the Olympic fortnight.Better still, the Olympic Committee furses all wood and launches its own brand squarely, Olympia, in 1963. "Nothing could be easier: at the time, tobacco was a government monopoly", underlines Zen Aoki, director of the museum of tobaccoand salt from the Japanese capital.

For each package purchased, 10 yen ends up directly in the organization's funds.The first version, without filter, does not take off, but success is there after adding the small piece of cellulose acetate ... and the rate of smokers, in men (above 80%) As in women (around 20%), leaps in this pre-Olympic year.As the World Health Organization notes, the mortality rate by lung cancer will also be thirty years later."It was clearly a luxury product, with tobacco leaves for the first time in Japan from Greece and Turkey," continues Zen Aoki. It was not possible to cultivate them in Japan. To give you an idea,A package cost 60 yen, when the most upscale brand of the time, Fuji, did not exceed 50. "

The IOC puts the Holà

The Tokyo initiative will be emulated ... Four years later, during the Grenoble Games (1968), where the local committee will undertake the Olympic rings to a nicotine merchant.Except that this time, the boss of the IOC, Avery Brundage, will deny an open letter to his subordinates to estimate that the joke has lasted enough.The joke of derived products at all costs, but not around a possible hiatus with the values of Olympism."It was not a public health problem at the time," recalls Michael Payne, the man who cleaned the UGIAs of the CIO stables in the field of merchandising in the 1980s.

"There was not even a framework defined by the IOC, until we prohibited in writing, in the Olympic charter, to associate the Olympic rings with tobacco or spirits," continues Michael Payne.There will be a last attempt, during the 1988 Seoul Games, to market tobacco stamped Olympic, but, quickly denounced, it will make a long time.This does not prevent diverted maneuvers: the Chinese equivalent of the Seita sought to associate with a medalist of the Athens Games (2004) to make retape.These red lines are constantly evolving: during the Atlanta Games (1996), the IOC thus put its veto that we affix the Olympic rings on packets of hygienic towels.

The Olympic cigarettes, struck by prohibition after only two Olympiads (curiously, no one had the idea of marketing tobacco stamped from the five rings in the 1950s), necessarily became a collector's object."I think I have a package at home, but where?, Smiles Markus Osterwalder, whose imposing collection is distributed in three different places. It is not that difficult to find.Pass on ebay recently. A pack of Olympia cigarettes with cigarettes, tired, necessarily, still inside, it will look in the 15 euros. And a complete collection of the 37 different packaging of the Peace cigarettes, it is for a hundredEuros. These are correct prices, and on the collective market, it remains very affordable. "

Note that the cessation of the marketing of Olympic cigarettes did not lead to the end of the lighters and other Olympic ashtrays.Ask Markus Osterwalder: "Cendriers? I have those of Melbourne (1956), Mexico (1968), Innsbrück (1964), Munich (1972), Montreal (1976) ..." Merchandising requires.