Until the year 1972, the International Olympic Committee refused money from corporate sponsors. After the retirement of President Avery Brundage, the IOC began seriously considering the potential of television advertising markets that were being made available for it. The Olympic brand had managed to grow very big and many international sponsors wished to promote their products with its help.

Under the suitable guidance of Juan Antonio Samaranch, the IOC harnessed the entire potential of the television. Till the year 1972, the IOC was run on a very meager budget. Avery Brundage, the president of the IOC from the year 1952 to the year 1972, refused to open the IOC’s doors to commercial sponsors because he believed that because of their influence, the decision making authority of the IOC would be mitigated. When he retired, the total amount of assets the IOC had was $2 million. However, after 1972, there was complete change in the way of thinking amongst the members of the IOC. In the next eight years, they managed to accumulate assets worth $45 million. In the year 1980, Juan Antonio Samaranch was elected president of the IOC and he had an aim of making the IOC financially independent.

The Summer Olympics of the year 1984 witnessed a revolutionary change in the amount of money generated by the Organizing Committee. The committee managed to amass a total surplus of $225 million via sponsorship deals. The IOC then looked for the possession of the sponsorship rights. Samaranch started a new program called TOP (The Olympic Program) in order to increase the Olympic brand value. To acquire a membership in TOP, a company has too shell out $50 million for four years. If a company becomes a member, then it has the right to use the Olympic symbol i.e. the intersecting rings, in its advertisements.

The Winter Olympics of 1956 were the first Olympic Games to be broadcasted on television to the entire world. Because of the widespread acceptance, the Winter Olympics of 1960 had their rights of broadcasting sold to huge broadcasting networks such as European Broadcasting Union and CBS, who paid heavy sums of money. The sale of broadcasting rights was one of the main reasons because of which the IOC managed to accumulate a huge amount of money. The costs of the rights kept increasing and CBS had to pay a staggering $375 million to obtain the broadcasting rights for the Nagano Olympics of 1998. NBC had to shell out an enormous sum of approximately $3.5 billion in order to broadcast the 2000, 2004, 2008 and 2012 games.