Despite his best efforts, Anthony Hollingsworth wasn’t getting anywhere. The seasoned creative specialist had been trying for two years to connect with brands to sponsor a country with athletes that qualified to compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics. As a passion project he was volunteered his time to connect the dots, and by day, he works at Wasserman, a top sports marketing and talent management company with a client portfolio that includes Gatorade, Nike, Jordan, and House Of Hoops among others.
He’s led major campaigns for some of the biggest in athletics, and yet, he couldn’t seem to break through to companies that would make perfect sense to align with. The reason? The Olympic athletes were from St. Vincent and The Grenadines, a country with 66% African descent.
“It’s really tough for smaller countries to get brand support,” Hollingsworth tells ESSENCE. “That’s what I was doing for the last two years. It’s been a two-year process and many of these companies start planning three to four years out.
But still, it’s nothing to them to give away four or five uniforms, but they’re so protective of their brands. They really don’t want to help.” He says he reached out to Nike, New Balance, and Adidas, among other leading athletics retailers to no avail.
He says that although really were receptive to the cause and believed in his initiative, the companies weren’t willing to sign on. “I was just like, ,” Hollingsworth says. “So, I had to go another .