“Inside Out,” Sports Business Journal, April 10, 2006

Great gig: Mike Hersom, EVP at ignition, an Atlanta-based marketing agency that Coke hired to shepherd the World Cup on a 100-day, 31-city tour, said from Singapore, “I’ve got a once-in-a-lifetime job. FIFA allowed Coca-Cola to take the World Cup on its first-ever tour. We started in Ghana where the newly elected president, John Agyekum Kufuor, raised it to a delighted crowd, proud of Ghana’s first World Cup qualification.” Hersom said taking the Cup, redesigned in 1974 by Italy’s Silvio Gazzaniga, to five continents showed him how much people have in common. “No matter what color, they love soccer and they love the World Cup.” The moment he’ll tell his grandchildren about: At a rock concert on the beach in Rio, 1994 Brazilian captain Carlos Dunga came on stage with the Cup. “Do you know what it sounds like when 250,000 Brazilians go berserk?”