Five and Five US have renewed their deal with Kia Motors to sponsor its US crime drama series, it was announced today.

Five hosts some of the most popular crime shows around including CSI, CSI Miami and CSI New York, NCIS, Law & Order (including the Criminal Intent and Special Victims Unit franchises).

Kia’s involvement with such popular shows is an effective way of building awareness of the brand and it’s clearly working so far as Kia sales continue to go up despite a falling market.  In the first quarter of 2008 Kia’s UK sales were up 22 per cent compared to the same time last year.  This success is down to the popular new cee’d range available with Kia’s unique seven-year bumper-to-bumper warranty.

The deal is one of Five’s biggest this year and includes a 15 second opening credit and a 10 second closing credit, plus 5 second break bumpers on each programme.  Overall this gives Kia 55 seconds of brand exposure within just an hour long programme.  Kia will also receive accreditation on related programming on Demand Five, the channel’s video-on-demand service.

The deal was negotiated between Sean Mellows, Head of TV at Manning Gottlieb OMD for Kia, and Five’s Sponsorship Controller, Rachael Wheeler.  The renewal sponsorship credits are produced by Mustoes.

Simon Hetherington, Marketing Director, Kia Motors (UK) Limited commented: "In order to reposition Kia from a value brand to a design-led quality brand, we created a campaign around the line ‘Designed to change your mind’ and made the pro_cee'd the hero.

“Each credit shows the car changing the meaning of a crime related statement, so the car literally changes your mind. They have been an incredible success with recognition, brand attribution and message comprehension all up."