No Global PR Agency for IOC Almaty 2022 Inspection

(ATR) Around the Rings learns that the Kazakh bid will be without a recognized international PR firm for the crucial IOC evaluation commission visit in two weeks.

Unlike rival 2022 bidder Beijing, which brought Weber Shandwick on board last year, Almaty 2022 has decided not to employ an established PR agency to aid strategy and promote its narrative at a critical moment in the bidding campaign.

At this juncture in an Olympic bidding process, with the impending arrival of IOC inspectors and less than six months before the IOC’s host city vote, a bid would be expected to have signed up a PR and communications strategist.

With IOC inspectors led by Russian Alexander Zhukov running a critical eye over Almaty’s Olympic plans from Feb. 14-18, the city’s bid committee will not have the firepower of a big PR company to highlight the strengths of the bid and guide international media coverage of the event.

Instead, ATR is told that Almaty will rely on several Olympic bidding consultants and its local media team to create and develop the bid narrative in the coming weeks and months.

Terrence Burns, managing director of Teneo, said the company is advising Almaty 2022, mainly working on the bid’s narrative and presentations to the Olympic family in the lead-up to the IOC vote on July 31 in Kuala Lumpur.

Veteran bid consultant Markus Kecht told ATR he has been involved in helping to set up the media visit to Almaty, based on his experience of working for the Munich 2018 Winter Olympic bid.

He describes his role as trying to "make life easy for the journalists, drafting a good side program for the media and give them [Almaty 2022] advice about logistics."

Stratos Safioleas, a consultant for the PyeongChang 2018 bid and now the organizing committee, said he had been employed to "advise the Almaty 2022 leadership on international media and social media strategy."

The IOC inspection team, which includes Olympic Games executive director Christophe Dubi, will scrutinize all 14 areas of the Almaty bid dossier submitted on Jan. 6.

The panel will also visit the proposed sites of 2022 Olympic venues. In March, the IOC delegation travels to Beijing to examine the Chinese capital’s bid proposals.

Almaty mayor Akhmetzhan Yessimov this week underscored the importance of the city’s Olympic ambitions.

"It is important for Almaty to win the right to host the Olympics. Our responsibility is to develop the city. The Olympics will be the main event which will contribute to the development of the city," he was quoted by the Astana Times.

"People must understand the significance of the Olympics. We have plenty of opportunities to win [the bid]."

Beijing is regarded as the hot favorite in the two-horse race for the Games.

But bid leader Zauresh Amanzholova, who is deputy mayor of Almaty, believes the Kazakh bid has a good chance of landing the Games.

"Many recommendations of Olympic Agenda 2020 were taken into consideration while developing the concept of the 2022 Winter Games," she was quoted by the newspaper.

"We believe our bid is a perfect fit with this new philosophy and brings essential benefits to Almaty and the Kazakhstani people."

Reported by Mark Bisson

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