When it comes to endorsements, tech companies have no problems turning to celebrities to make what used to be nerdy or geeky become “cool”. We have seen how Intel had used will.i.am, the front man of the Black Eyed Peas, Ashton Kutcher with Lenovo, and Alicia Keys with BlackBerry, just to name a few. However it seems that at one point in time, BlackBerry could have closed a deal with teen pop sensation, Justin Bieber. According to a BusinessWeek report by Vincent Washington who was a senior business development manager at BlackBerry until 2011, Justin Bieber had approached the company with a plan, which was that he’d represent them as long as they gave him $200,000 and 20 devices.
“One thing we missed out on was that Justin Bieber wanted to rep BlackBerry. He said, ‘Give me $200,000 and 20 devices, and I’m your brand ambassador,’ basically.” When Washington pitched the idea to the BlackBerry executives during a meeting, they laughed at him and rejected his idea. Washington did not state when Bieber attempted to pitch his idea, but presumably it was at the very latest in 2011, perhaps when he was not as big a celebrity as he is today, and when BlackBerry was not in such a mess yet.
It is unclear as to how much value Bieber would have brought to BlackBerry; perhaps he could have convinced hordes of screaming teenagers to purchase BlackBerry devices, but we guess we will never know. What do you guys think? Did BlackBerry make a mistake by passing up on Justin Bieber as a potential ambassador?
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