May 24, 2012
Bridgestone Americas Named Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal's "Sports
Sponsor of the Year"
NEW YORK — Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations (Bridgestone
Americas) was named "Sports Sponsor of the Year" Wednesday evening at the 2012 Sports
Business Awards ceremony, an annual celebration of excellence in sports business
held by Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal, the industry's leading trade
publication.
The award, judged by a panel of industry executives and representatives from SportsBusiness
Journal and SportsBusiness Daily, was accepted by Phil Pacsi, Vice President of
Customer Marketing & Training for Bridgestone Americas.
"It's an honor to accept this award on behalf of all the hard-working, talented
and innovative people at Bridgestone Americas and our agencies," Pacsi said. "Only
through extraordinary collaboration could we have achieved this success. Bridgestone
Americas is passionate about performance, and our sports marketing relationships
present the perfect platform for us to convey our performance message to our target
demographics."
This is the third time in four years that Bridgestone Americas had been nominated
in the category and its first win. The company's Bridgestone brand is the Official
Tire of the NFL, the NHL® and the PGA TOUR®; and its Firestone brand is
the Official Tire of the IZOD IndyCar® Series and Major League Baseball. This
past year saw the launch of an entirely new sports-based Bridgestone brand-building
campaign built on six months of extensive consumer research. This campaign, titled
"Time to Perform," shows what would happen if Bridgestone's advanced tire technologies
were applied to the world of sports.
"Through our sports marketing relationships and activation programs, we have been
able to connect with consumers and get them thinking about tires in a completely
new way," Pacsi remarked. "We have had great success utilizing sports to explain
in specific terms how our products and technologies are engineered to deliver a
better driving experience."
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About Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations:
Nashville, Tenn.-based Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations (BATO) is a business
unit of Bridgestone Americas, Inc., whose parent company, Bridgestone Corporation,
is the world's largest tire and rubber company. Reporting into the BATO business
unit are the company's Latin American tire operations; the U.S. and Canadian consumer
and commercial tire businesses; and Bridgestone Retail Operations, LLC, which operates
the largest network of company-owned automotive service providers in the world.
BATO develops, manufactures and markets Bridgestone, Firestone and associate brand
tires. The commercial tire division is focused on retail, wholesale and original
equipment markets, supplying tires to passenger, light truck, commercial vehicle,
off road, motorcycle, agricultural and retread markets.
