UP406 The Buy Side: What Does PepsiCo Want?

The Buy Side is our regular series talking with brand side marketers about sport and sponsorship. This week’s guest is Mark Kirkham, the SVP & Chief Marketing Officer of PepsiCo, one of the biggest spenders in the sports industry, whose brands such as Aquafina, Pepsi, Gatorade and Lay’s are associated with a huge number of major events globally across a portfolio that includes official partnerships such as UEFA Champions League, the NFL, the Saudi Premier League, the LPGA, WNBA and EA FC or what used to be called the FIFA game franchise, but also a large number of tie ups with individual sports stars, musicians and other creators.  With this type of spend, comes influence and power. How, where and with whom Pepsi spends its money is a signal to every sports rights holder to shape their commercial programmes to catch Mark Kirkham’s eye. What are the implications of this for sport and what does Pepsi want sport to be? The Buy Side is sponsored by KORE Software the global leader in engagement marketing solutions. More than 900 brands, venues, and sports organisations trust KORE’s tools and platforms as a source of truth to manage partnerships, assets and measure impact, with real-time insights. Through Sponsorship Management and Evaluation, Ticketing, Fan Engagement, Data Management and Analytics, KORE unites corporate sponsors, properties, and their fans with solutions that help enhance the fan experience, drive smarter decisions, and enable marketing and operations teams to spend time where it matters.  Learn more at KORESoftware.com or follow them LinkedIn or Twitter. Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.