Bringing Sailing to the Masses - No Rules.

An Extreme 40 catamaran flat out is a spectacular sight. Even powerboats struggle to keep up with these racing machines and when things go wrong, they go wrong in a big, spectacular way. Put them in confined spaces in the middle of the city and you have a recipe for a sports entertainment property that satisfies the needs of sponsors, spectators and media alike.

The iShares Cup has broken out of the sailing press in 2007 and thanks to big names like Ben Ainslie, has started to appear on the radar of non-sailing sports fans.

Yachtsponsorship.com has published an interview with OC Events boss, Mark Turner about why throwing away the rulebook has created such a compelling product.

Nationwide Activate NASCAR Sponsorship

At Bristol last weekend, Nationwide, together with Nationwide Series team owner Kevin Harvick, launched its Switch and Save up to $500 campaign, with the grand prize an “Ultimate NASCAR Experience.”

“One of the things that Nationwide wanted to do when we came into the sport was to look for ways to engage the fan and to make this series as interesting or more interesting than it was in the past,” Aman said. “This is a way for the fan to engage in the Nationwide Series and also to get a much better price for their insurance.”

Fans can call (877) NW-SERIES (877-697-3743) and request a quote on their car insurance, as well as register for the grand prize drawing. By making the switch to Nationwide, fans can also save up to $500 on their car insurance. Fans can also visit www.nationwide.com/switch and do the same.

“This sweepstakes offers race fans the opportunity to be trackside at Las Vegas, in a fully loaded Camping World RV and spend some time with Kevin during the weekend,” Aman said.

“To come in and see all the activation that has been done, I’m proud to be part of the new campaign,” Harvick said. “It’s going to be a lot of fun to mingle with the winners at Las Vegas.”

For Aman, this first significant foray into activating Nationwide’s sponsorship entitlement has gone well.

“Nationwide is very pleased,” he said. “The coverage that Nationwide and the series has been receiving has been excellent. Our media partners have done a great job changing the name of the series to Nationwide and helping us say a little bit about why Nationwide got into the sport. Overall, we’re very excited about where we are right now.”

Aman said that Nationwide has run sweepstakes surrounding its sponsorship of the Nationwide golf tour, but this is the first for NASCAR. As such, response to this promotion will go a long way toward determining what kind of support the company has among NASCAR fans.

“This year, having this level of sponsorship, we’re feeling our way through to see what kind of response we can get with a three-month promotion, using a highly visible, well-respected driver as part of our effort,” Aman said. “We’re looking for 50,000 to 100,000 people to enroll in the sweepstakes and a number of them deciding that we should be their insurance provider.”

Aman said that there had been some surprises in his company’s first year of series sponsorship, but none that were really big.

“Having dealt with Speedway Motorsports for the past eight years, there weren’t really any surprises,” he said. “What has been a surprise is, I think, the interest of the team owners and team members wanting to get to know us, learning what Nationwide was about and letting us know about the sport they love and what they want to see changed in that sport.”

Harvick echoed Aman’s comments.

“When they came in, everything had kind of happened last-minute, and they were very anxious to get everything activated and get their name out there,” he said. “As we’ve gone on, the whole Nationwide team has been very active, asked a lot of questions of the teams about what we thought of the sport, working with NASCAR and where the series is going and what the series is all about. Once they got their feet on the ground, they’ve been very involved with the teams going forward.”

Chinese Sponsors Reviewed

Recognizing a gap in studies of Olympic marketing ahead of the 2008 Games, Asian marketing agency R3 and Chinese media research firm CSM Media Research launched an independent tracking and research division. Its quarterly studies have shed light on which Olympic sponsors are winning and losing on the ground in China. R3 Principal Greg Paull, who’s leading those studies, sat down with SportsBusiness Journal staff writer Tripp Mickle to talk about the results.

Which one of the TOP programs have been the most successful?
Paull: I think, for Coke, the torch relay has been a phenomenal success. Look at sampling. No one knew in China that Coke had to be cold. So what have they done for the torch relay? They’ve served up 100 million Cokes to people - one by one through 112 cities. That discipline is going to completely change the way Coke goes to market in China, and it wouldn’t have happened without the Olympics.

Any others that stand out?
Paull: J&J did a great setup in primary schools to teach them about the Olympics. You would expect the government to do that, but J&J came up with the training tools, the posters, the stickers and all of that stuff. They went into 400,000 schools across China to teach them about the Olympics with J&J-branded materials.

Who is winning the sneaker war category here on the ground among Nike, Adidas and Li Ning?
Paull: Our view is that if Adidas did not sponsor the Olympics, they would have been in a lot of trouble because Nike and Liu Xiang is a powerful combination together and if they had that sponsorship, they would have leveraged that. Meanwhile, Li Ning is Mr. Olympics, so if he’d had the official sponsorship he would have done a lot. Adidas did the right thing to invest because if someone else had it, they would have been struggling. They are, in fact, in first position in our study. (We have several clients in the sneaker war category and we do our study anyway regardless of our clients.)

How are some of the Chinese companies that people in the U.S. may be less familiar with doing?
Paull: A lot of local companies have done very well, better than the multinationals. Yili, Lenovo, China Mobile - all of these are in the top 10 in our studies, better than Visa, McDonald’s, J&J.

Which of those stand out most?
Paull: Yili, a local milk company, has done a great job. They’ve grabbed the right athletes like Liu Xiang and used them in a very creative way. They tried to do their own version of a torch relay. They ran a health tour that went to 100 cities around China, set up a booth and gave away samples. They also turned that into a TV show.

When the Olympics close, what will be the legacy for sponsors? Are sponsors going to be entrenched enough?
Paull: There will be winners and losers. We’re coming back in November to do the rest of our study. A lot of legacy also will be internal. The way they work will change. They’ll be better marketers as a result of it. You’re talking now about a competitive marketplace that has changed.

From Sports Business Daily

Puma backs 'Bolt' to beat big boys.

Puma is watching its sales to go up another notch as the ‘Lightning’ Bolt wins the men’s 200-metre final in Beijing’s Bird’s Nest stadium this morning.

The German manufacturer’s sneaker sales were reported by the Financial Times to have increased by more than two million pairs just one hour after the world’s fastest man held up his Theseus II spikes before the flashing cameras after his perfect run.

“There definitely has been an increase in awareness,” said store manager Margaux Brown. “A lot more people are coming in, a lot more people are calling us. I even received a call from a lady in England a while ago.”

Puma’s investment might well have been worth the wait. The sports gear manufacturer has been a long-time sponsor of Jamaican athletes, claiming among its first, Jamaica’s sprint queen Merlene Ottey and double silver medallist Juliet Cuthbert in the 1990s. It has, however, only been a sponsor of the Jamaican track team since 2002.

Puma arrived in Beijing nowhere near rivals Nike and Adidas in terms of market value and sales, according to the Financial Times, trailing in the number of Olympic athletes contracted to wear its apparel, and behind in the race for a share of the lucrative Chinese market.

But Puma came out the star in the most anticipated showdown in the Olympics, and probably the most watched sporting event this year, when the Puma-clad Bolt defeated Nike-signed Asafa Powell. World champion Tyson Gay, signed to Adidas, failed to make it to the final.

Manchester United sign Saudi Sponsorship Deal

Saudi Telecom Co (STC) is set to sign a marketing deal with football club Manchester United that could be worth $18.6 million (9.3 million pounds), a spokesman said, its first-ever deal with a non-Saudi football club.

Football is a favoured pastime in the Middle East and telecom firms, including Emirates Telecommunications Corp, are often lead sponsors of sporting events.

STC has spent more than $6 billion in foreign expansion since June 2007 as it faces greater competition in its home market, where securing sponsorship deals with local football clubs helps telecom companies retain customers in a saturated market.

"We are at Manchester now. We will have a press conference tomorrow and the deal will be announced today during a Manchester United game," STC spokesman Mohamed al-Faraj told Reuters on Sunday.

The Sunday Times reported on Sunday that the five-year deal would grant STC rights to use Manchester United's logo and imagery in its marketing in Saudi Arabia.

STC would be able to offer its subscribers video clips of match highlights, the paper said.

"The arrangement is said to be one of the biggest non-shirt sponsorship deals in British football," the Times said.

STC competes in Saudi Arabia with Etihad Etisalat (Mobily) and Zain Saudi Arabia. The incumbent operator has paid $200 million for five-year sponsorship agreements with three Saudi clubs.

Its rival Mobily signed a 200-million-riyal (28.5 million pounds) sports-marketing deal with Saudi club al-Hilal last year -- then described as the Middle East's largest ever deal of its kind.

STC's first foreign acquisition was of a 25 percent stake in Malaysia's Maxis for $3 billion, opening markets in India, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Many leading names in the world of football finance, including Manchester United, have sought to develop strong ties in various Asian countries in recent years, through sponsorship, tours and links with local clubs.

02 Extend England Rugby Sponsorship

O2 today announced it has extended its contract with the RFU to continue as the official sponsor of England Rugby for a further four years.

England team
The £4millon a season deal between O2 and the RFU will be visually reflected through O2’s extensive kit sponsorship of all fifteen-a-side England men’s teams including the senior team, the Saxons as well as the U20s, U18s and U16s. For the first time O2 will also sponsor the England women’s rugby team who are the current European Champions as well as being the RBS 6 Nations champions three years running.

It will also further establish O2 as the exclusive telecommunications provider to both the RFU and individual England squad members and provides an extensive package of rights including ticketing and hospitality at matches.

O2 Rugby Content
The new deal will continue to give O2 player access rights on both a squad and individual player level, to enable the creation of unique mobile content for customers over the next four years.

Branding and O2 Experiences
The sponsorship will provide O2 with extended rights to build a greater brand presence at Twickenham both through stadium advertising and by facilitating better O2 customer experiences.

Ronan Dunne, CEO of O2 UK,

From a brand perspective the partnership with England Rugby provides us not only with great visibility but also allows us to create unrivalled mobile content and experiences for O2 customers.

O2 want to spread the positive messages about rugby union to a wider audience and their support of the Go Play Rugby and Play On campaigns ensure that we have regular contact with our supporters and expose the sport to potential new players and fans. They have been an outstanding sponsor over a number of years and they are the epitome of a company that believes in brand building and the longevity of its key business relationships.

This long term partnership is one of the longest running sports sponsorships and has been extremely successful in raising O2’s brand exposure and awareness with this sponsorship creating 27% brand awareness. It also helps to build brand affinity through delivering unique VIP offers and experiences for O2 customers.

Microsoft's 'Free' NASCAR Sponsorship

Leave it to the geeks at Microsoft to figure out how to get the company's logo on a racing car--for free.

The Redmond, Wash.-based software giant snagged a $1 million market-value spot on a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series car without paying a penny. Instead, Microsoft got small businesses that use its software and resellers to pony up the sponsorship cash. So far, 40 small businesses and resellers have put in about $165,000 on behalf of Microsoft.

Since the June 1 race in Dover, Del., Microsoft's small business logo has been emblazoned on the rear-quarter panel of Michael Waltrip Racing team's #00 car. The businesses and resellers that put up the cash, however, don't get to place their logos on the car. Under their agreement with Microsoft, they are allowed to put their logos on a mock-up of the #00 car, and they can post that image on their Web site.


Retail giant Target, a longtime sponsor for the Chip Ganassi Racing team, has been known to offset its sponsorship costs by offering vendors a piece of the action: They might get a NASCAR-themed display in Target stores or even have their logo prominently featured on a car for a single race.

But the Microsoft-Waltrip arrangement is unique in that the team is banking on the tech giant’s ability to corral customers who’ll foot the bill for the spot. "I think it speaks to the economic climate that these teams are dealing with," says Ardy Arani of The Championship Group, an Atlanta sports marketing company. "Desperate times call for desperate measures."

Less than a decade ago, primary sponsors (the ones that get their logo on the hood of the race car) routinely paid teams under eight figures. Today, those sponsors might be asked to fork over as much as $20 million. As a result, some sponsors are balking, forcing teams to get creative with their sponsorship schemes. "What might’ve made sense at $8 to $12 million becomes a difficult equation at $16 to $20 million, because you aren’t necessarily selling more product just because the racing has gotten more expensive,” Arani says.

The Waltrip team will need at least another 200 sponsors to break even on the space's $1 million market value.

From Forbes

Football Sponsorship By Numbers

Some interesting figured from the Independent relating to Football sponsorship deals.

Manchester United
Main sponsor: AIG (Insurance)
Cost per annum: £14.125m
Kit supplier: Nike

The AIG deal is worth £56.5m over four years, Nike paid the club £303m for licensing rights, and Budweiser is the club's official beer. Still no word on why former Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Lee Daley, lasted only four months as commercial director last year.

Chelsea
Main sponsor: Samsung (Electronics)
Cost per annum: £10m
Kit supplier: Adidas

Football sponsorship is a key battleground in the ultra competitive consumer electronics market. South Korean giant Samsung grabbed the Chelsea shirt after they lost out to Sony for Uefa Champions League and Fifa World Cup rights. As an IOC partner Samsung also sponsored the Olympic torch relay around the world, escorted by the controversial men in blue suits.

Liverpool
Main sponsor: Carlsberg (Brewing)
Cost per annum: £7m
Kit supplier: Adidas

Carlsberg's 15-year commitment is the longest commercial relationship in British football, but the club may seek a shirt and naming rights deal to fund their long-awaited new stadium, which may test the brewers resolve. Last year, striker Fernando Torres sold more shirts than any player in the Premier League, not including those carrying his own El Niño brand.

Newcastle United
Main sponsor: Northern Rock (Finance)
Cost per annum: £5m
Kit supplier: Adidas

The nationalisation of Northern Rock means Kevin Keegan's team is partly funded by the taxpayer despite being owned by billionaire retailer Mike Ashley. Calls to end the relationship have fallen on deaf ears: "I believe it is in the commercial interest of the bank that we should continue," said N. Rock.

Arsenal
Main sponsor: Emirates (Airline)
Cost per annum: £5m
Kit supplier: Nike

Arsene Wenger has transformed "boring Arsenal" into one of the most aspirational brands in football, but his antipathy to summer tours means the club won't be "taking the live experience" to America or the Far East soon, despite the chance of free Emirates flights. Back home, the Emirates stadium has become a London landmark.

Tottenham Hotspur
Main sponsor: Mansion.com (Casino and Poker)
Cost per annum: £5m
Kit supplier: Puma

Spurs were the second choice for Mansion, which came close to a deal with Manchester United. The sponsor accused United of "double-dealing", while the club said concerns over the gambling and casino link turned them off.

Aston Villa
Main sponsor: Acorns (Children's Hospice)
Cost per annum: Free
Kit supplier: Nike

Randy Lerner, Villa's American owner, has taken a leaf out of Barcelona's tie-up with Unicef, Villa gave their shirt free to a local children's hospice, costing the club around £5m a year in revenue.

Everton
Main sponsor: Chang (Brewing)
Cost per annum: £2.6m
Kit supplier: Umbro

Chang is part of the ThaiBev brewing giant and the deal is testimony to the Premier League's international TV reach. Alcohol sponsorship of sport is set to come under renewed pressure as the government acts on binge drinking – acting on advice from the Portman Group, the brand has chosen to remove its logo from children's shirts.

Manchester City
Main sponsor: Thomas Cook
Cost per annum: £1m
Kit supplier: Le Coq Sportif

No Ronaldinho to sell the City shirt as the Brazilian star chose Milan, and fans and sponsors will take little consolation that his new club played in the Thomas Cook Cup, a pre-season tournament. Thomas Cook is into its sixth year as sponsor – and fans are four times as likely to book holidays with the firm.

Hull City
Main sponsor: Karoo (Internet Service Provider)
Cost per annum: £800,000
Kit supplier: Umbro

The newly promoted club hopes this year's shirt will fare better than a previous Tiger skin incarnation, which was voted worst ever football kit in a poll of readers of The Sun. Karoo is a local ISP owned by Kingston Communications, which is the monopoly web supplier for Hull.

Blackburn Rovers
Main sponsor: Crown Paints
Cost per annum: £1.5m
Kit supplier: Umbro

Manufacturing problems at Umbro's factory unfortunately meant the launch of the new shirt was delayed and the club took a hit in all important pre-season shirt sales. After an absence of over a decade, the Crown Paints logo comes back into football. The local brand was one of the first shirt sponsors and is synonymous with Liverpool in the Kenny Dalglish era.

West Ham United
Main sponsor: XL Holidays
Cost per annum: £1m
Kit supplier: Umbro

There are two views of the new away kit. The official line is that it recalls Hammers heroes such as Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters. Some fans see it differently: "It's a rip off of that crappy Seventies England shirt," wrote one blogger, "must've taken them about 10 minutes to think that one up, thanks for nothing!"

Portsmouth
Main sponsor: OKI (Printers)
Cost per annum: £800,000
Kit supplier: Canterbury

Last year's FA Cup win gave Japanese printer manufacturer OKI some welcome additional worldwide exposure. The club is supporting the OKI Street Arts Community initiative, encouraging school-aged children to get involved in the arts, and the company's PR agency Whiteoaks has been pushing the OKI Street Sixes, a youth football league, part of a Hampshire-based drive to reduce street crime.

Fulham
Main sponsor: LG (Electronics)
Cost per annum: £3m
Kit supplier: Nike

No one can say Mohamed Al Fayed lacks imagination when it comes to negotiating with sponsors. Bundled in to LG's deal is floor space at Mr Al Fayed-owned Harrods and the roof of Craven Cottage, which is positioned under the Heathrow flight path. The sponsor says that nothing should be read into the fact that the entire senior marketing team left the company shortly after the deal was signed.

Renewed Sponsorship for Wales Rugby

Rugby regions the Cardiff Blues and the Ospreys have announced lucrative new shirt sponsorship deals.

The Ospreys confirmed it has renewed a shirt sponsorship deal with energy company npower for the coming season, as part of a £700,000 investment package from businesses into the region.

The green energy developer and operator reaffirmed its backing for the club [for the fourth year] with a one year deal valued at £180,000 – the largest individual sponsorship in Welsh regional rugby.

The Ospreys said the deal formed part of a sponsorship package worth £700,000.

The rest of the funding comes from secondary sponsors Persimmon Homes, Worthingtons, John West Foods, Cuddy Group, Trade Centre Wales, Trade Depot, Solo Cleaning and Taylors Regional Foods who have all agreed to extend their relationship with the Ospreys – whilst the region has secured new sponsorship deals with Fujitsu, 4U Recruitment and Land Rover.

Paul Cowling managing director of npower renewables said: “As we enter our fourth year as primary sponsors of the Ospreys we look forward to building on the broad range of community initiatives that already exist due our sponsorship.

“Our association with the Ospreys represents our ongoing commitment to communities in South Wales, and countless local groups and organisations have already benefited as a direct result of our sponsorship.

Rivals Cardiff Blues has signed a main team sponsorship deal with technology venture company EADS Defence and Security.

The company, which employs 1.200 in Newport, has entered in a one year undisclosed sponsorship deal with the professional rugby region,.

EADS DS vice president Mike Simms said: "We are proud to support the Cardiff Blues. The rugby team is an important part of community life in the capital city and the wider region.

"Teaming up with Cardiff Blues is a great move for a world class knowledge-led company like ours. Skill, innovation, commitment and teamwork are essential to succeed in business and rugby.

Camping World to Sponsor GIR NASCAR Craftsman Trucks

Gateway International Raceway announced today that Camping World has entered into a multi-year agreement with the facility that includes title sponsorship of this year's NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at GIR. The Camping World 200 presented by Honda Power Equipment is scheduled for Sept. 6.

Camping World is a sponsor at several levels in NASCAR, including the NASCAR Camping World East and West Series, as well as the title sponsor of several races at different tracks across the country and several drivers, including the defending NCTS champion and Kevin Harvick Inc. driver, Ron Hornaday.

"The sponsorship of the Camping World 200 presented by Honda Power Equipment complements our growing involvement in NASCAR Racing," said Marcus Lemonis, Chairman and CEO of Camping World. "We know thousands of our customers from the St. Louis area fill the stands for this weekend each year and we are pleased to support their passion for racing.

"This sponsorship program will assist us in introducing our brand to the outdoor enthusiasts in the area which is important to us as our future plans include opening a permanent Camping World store in close proximity to the Raceway," added Lemonis.

It was at Gateway last year when Ron Hornaday took the points lead that would eventually lead him to his record-tying third NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series title and give Harvick, a two-time GIR winner in the NASCAR Nationwide Series, his first championship as an owner.

"It's hard to find a race on the NASCAR schedule where you don't see the familiar blue and yellow Camping World logo," GIR Vice President and General Manager Lenny Batycki said. "We're honored to be a part of the Camping World family and honored to be affiliated with one of the most renowned racers in NASCAR, Ron Hornaday."

Olympics helps Russian Sponsorship Growth

In Russia, the relationship between sport and business has been one of patronage than partnership, meaning that sport clubs and personalities are often dependent on sugar daddies or state corporations, and Russian athletes miss out on the lucrative advertising contracts enjoyed by their well-heeled counterparts in Western Europe, America or East Asia.

Now, led by a wave of sporting success, a consumer boom and increasing advertising savvy, that mentality is starting to change.

Whereas in the United States, 15 percent of advertisements use celebrities, with the figure rising to around 40 percent in East Asia, in Russia the total is a miniscule 2 percent. But the volume of contracts is set to shoot up from $60 million in 2007 to about $200 million this year.

That means that come autumn, the country should be festooned with pictures of victorious Olympians, promoting everything from washing machines to mobile phones.

Omsk-born Alexei, 24, won gold in Athens four years ago and has a number of sponsorship and endorsement contracts with Russian companies, his father said. His first fight is scheduled for Monday.

"The number of companies and the interest has increased since the last games," he said. "It is not a massive increase, but the amount has gone up steadily."

Many Russian sportsmen and women will be looking for inspiration to their compatriots who have made it big on the international stage and forged a global name for themselves. All follow in the wake of golfer Tiger Woods, who looks set to become the world's first billionaire sportsman over the next few years.

"Once the Olympics are over, the winning athletes will be looking at average contract from $50,000 to $200,000," Kormilitsyn said. Athletics and boxing are the most profitable Olympics disciplines, and firms from the telecommunications and banking sectors are keenest to cash in, he said.

It's not just for the athletes that this year's Olympics represents a potential boom time. China has spent $42 billion getting the country ready, and income from both broadcast rights and sponsorship are soaring.

As they set out to crack the mammoth Chinese markets, companies are betting big on Olympic sponsorship.

From 2001 to 2004, sponsorship made up just over one-third of total revenue for the Olympics. Fees for broadcast rights account for just over half of all revenue during that period. Organizers estimate that the Beijing Games will bring in over $1.7 billion in broadcast rights.

But although they get their equal share of the central pot, the Russian Olympic Committee has lagged behind many of its counterparts in other countries.

Compared with the lengthy list of major corporate sponsors on the glossy web site of the U.S. Olympic Committee, the list of corporate sponsors for the Russian team is dominated by state firms, such as VTB, Sberbank and Aeroflot.

VTB is sponsoring the men's volleyball, women's basketball and gymnastics teams.

"They're the most promising. We think they will win," said Vasily Titov, deputy chairman of the VTB bank management board. "We want to be associated with the leaders." The bank has featured the basketball players in advertising campaigns.

From The Moscow Times

Crunch Changes Cowes Crowd

According to an article by the BBC, the last Cowes Week to be sponsored by Insurance company Skandia was not too badly affected by the ‘credit crunch’.

Despite a year of financial turmoil, the streams of yachts heading out onto the Solent are still flying the flags of some of the world’s biggest banks.

Back on land the main shopping street is packed with groups of corporate hospitality guests making their way round the designer boutiques.

And yet, though the well-heeled crowd may not yet be counting the pennies, there are some early signs that the slowdown is beginning to effect the very genteel world of Cowes Week.

But the boss of On Deck, Mike Williams, has seen a change in the make-up of his clientele this year.

“We’re probably 20% down on the corporate hospitality side of things, but that’s been made up by sailing enthusiasts booking the boats as individuals,” he says.

One of the other parts of Mike’s business is the individual regattas the company organises for different sectors of business, ranging from the Banking and Finance Regatta in September to a race for the furniture industry.

“You would expect that these regattas would be hit hard, but because there are so many sailors within the companies, there are still plenty of entries for this year,” says Mr Williams.

Among the punters watching the live bands is a group of hedge fund managers who’ve chartered a yacht for the day.

“There’s still a lot of money around here,” says the skipper of the boat.

“The higher end does not seem to be feeling the pinch. In fact they seem pretty immune from the credit crunch.”

And while the Pimm’s and champagne continues to flow, it would seem that the waves of the credit crunch are not quite ready to engulf the Cowes regatta quite yet.

Etihad Credit Sponsorship for Growth

Four years ago, no-one had heard of Etihad, it was an infant airline. Now it is the world's fastest growing airline, and global marketing chief Peter Baumgartner says it has been sponsorship, not advertising, that has allowed the Abu Dhabi carrier to achieve growth of more than 40 per cent every year.

Many companies put advertising first, Baumgartner says, but the challenge of getting the name of the airline in front of millions of potential customers in dozens of markets required a special strategy.

The answer, he says, was sponsorship.

"We decided to spend a lot of our budget on sponsorship," he says. "Formula One is an example of how we have approached this strategically."

In 2007, Etihad was the sponsor of the Spyker Formula One team, but this year the airline has taken the plunge by linking its name with the biggest brand in the business, Ferrari.

Baumgartner says the fit is a natural one for a company that sees itself as innovative, cutting-edge and technically driven.

"Ferrari is a commanding brand and we felt that Ferrari would bring a lot to us. It all fits together."

The sponsorship-driven element of Etihad is very much strategic, but there also has to be a degree of opportunism in applying such a strategy, he says.

"We have been quite active in recent times and fortunately there have been a couple of opportunities.

"You have to grab these when they are around."

Another of those opportunities was the chance to link up with British football team Chelsea.

It may not be a motor racing team, but the sponsorship works in the same way.

"If you consider Chelsea, it works in a very similar fashion to Ferrari," Baumgartner says. "We are trying to take our Abu Dhabi-based brand to the world and that means more than just placing a logo on a team.

"We have managed internally to build quite a skilled sponsorship team.

"We have also been exploring sponsorship from the very first day." The success of that strategy was on show last month when the airline won the world's best marketing strategy award handed out by Airline Business magazine in Britain.

The magazine lauded the success of the brand's sponsorships, along with its consistent message from the time customers were picked up by its limousines to when they experienced its in-flight service.

Ferrari and Chelsea may be among the biggest sports brands in the world, but that has not stopped Etihad from making some more eclectic deals as well.

Baumgartner highlights the airline's sponsorship of the All Ireland Hurling Championships.

Although the sport may have limited appeal, the fact that the airline has taken an interest in the sport at all has created a bond with Irish fans of the sport, and this has fed back directly into Etihad's success.

"Next to giving us overnight fame in Ireland, hurling is a sport that is very close to the community and has great emotional links with the people of Ireland," Baumgartner says.

Etihad is an airline out to market itself, but he notes that it is also a marketing tool in its own right.

The airline was originally commissioned to help grow awareness of Abu Dhabi as a tourist destination.

A Ferrari-based theme park is under construction there and the capital of the United Arab Emirates hosts its first grand prix sponsored by Etihad later this year.

The strategy has helped to turn Etihad into the world's fastest growing airline, Baumgartner says.

"Getting back to the fact that sponsorship is more than just putting a logo on a shirt or car, the real value is when you tap into the community behind it."

From: The Australian

Are Olympics Sponsorships Worth It?

An article today in Business Week, suggests that for some blue chip brands, the answer is no. High profile sponsors who are supporting Beijing, but not prepared to sponsor future games include Kodak, Lenovo, and J&J.

The Lenovo example is pretty self-explanatory. Its sponsorship of the 2006 Winter Games in Turin and the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing will be a one-time shot for the Chinese PC maker. For Kodak, a sponsor of the games since 1986, the returns just aren't there. Antonio Perez, CEO says "It's just not the best way for us to spend our money."

While China is seen as an opportunity to get a brand in front of millions of new consumers, some research suggests few consumers even notice who is backing the Games. In a survey of 1,500 Chinese city dwellers earlier this year by London's Fournaise Marketing Group, only 15% could name two of the 12 global sponsors, and just 40% could name one sponsor: Coca-Cola. Adding to the confusion for consumers are 21 additional national-level sponsors, including Adidas and Volkswagen.

Others see it differently. Coke has signed on through the 2020 Games. "Coke has not in the least reconsidered its Olympic sponsorship," says Kevin Tressler, director of Coke's Worldwide Sports & Entertainment Marketing.

The Chinese games potentially offer a unique set of circumstances to sponsors. As well as restrictions in the IOC charter that ensure nonsponsors' ads are restricted in and around Olympics venues, Beijing has extended the ban to all outdoor advertising in the city's airports, buses, and billboards within the city center.

In recent games, the debate as to whether to sponsor the officials of the IOC and host government or the competing athletes has probably come down on the side of the latter. Nike especially have made much of the fact that their shoes are won by the gold medal winners while official sponsor Adidas shows are worn by the men in suits. However, in China, things are different. Government officials will notice which companies show up in support even if consumers don't, a major factor for sponsors in a country where guanxi, or relationships, are such an integral part of doing business.

London 2012 will be a different story. Marketers will have to weigh whether there are more cost-effective ways to reach consumers and leverage Olympic enthusiasm without having to pay the high price. Frank Vial, strategy director of branding agency Landor Associates, argues that in a world that's moving toward targeted marketing, "maybe the Olympics will have to reinvent itself as something other than a global, monolithic brand."

Columbia's Tour de France sponsorship 'an unqualified success'.

A great article in 'The Orgeon' today about a last minute sponsorship deal that delivered great value for money.

The recent deal by outdoor apparel company Columbia to sponsor the Team High Road cycling team after previous sponsor T-Mobile pulled out due to a doping scandal resulted in Chief Executive Tim Boyle saying "The sponsorship was an unqualified success by any measure."

Despite initial objections from European managers, the deal to promote Columbia's Omni-Shade Ultra-Violet-ray-protection material resulted in results that were pleasing to management.

For one, Boyle said, the sponsorship boosted company morale. More importantly, statistical measures and anecdotal impressions suggest the team and its five stage victories thrust Columbia's name and the yellow-flared trademark of its Omni-Shade fabric into broad exposure in the prized markets of intense Tour de France fandom.

Although Columbia does not actually make cycling apparel, they still wanted to make the link between the fabric and the world famous cycling event. Columbia's sales and marketing team came up with the idea of placing "Omni-Shade" beneath the company's logo on the jerseys.

Columbia would not say how much it paid for the sponsorship, but industry experts say it likely cost more than $3 million -- much less than T-Mobile probably paid.

"No other team had anywhere near as many stage wins, which is what gets the majority of the daily coverage globally, and all the coverage in the rider's home market," Boyle said. "When you add in the coverage we're likely to get with the riders in the Olympics, this is better than a grand slam home run."

Columbia spokeswoman Leslie Constans said more than 11,000 articles in 85 countries mentioned Team Columbia in some fashion this month.

French and Spanish newspapers devoted more pages than ever, both in print and online, to this year's race, with Team Columbia's five stage-victory salutes figuring prominently, said Carlton Reid, owner of Quickrelease.tv, a U.K. cycling news Web site.

"You'd be hard-pushed to sponsor a minor soccer team for a season for the money Columbia would have spent on this team," Reid said.

Reid and others think Columbia's three-year deal will continue to pay dividends.

Cowes Week Still Without a Sponsor

The annual Cowes Week kicks off this week, but the organisers have not managed to find a title sponsor to replace Skandia, whose long running partnership ends this year.

Skandia's sponsorship of Cowes Week has run for 14 years including this year's event, which takes place at the beginning of August. It was known as long ago as March 2007 that its support would finish this year.

Cowes Week Limited, the company that runs the event, today issued a statement saying that it had not been able to finalise a new partner before this year's event.

Stuart Quarrie, Cowes Week's chief executive, said: "Although discussions are progressing well, we are not in a position to make an announcement before or during the regatta.

"However, we do have every confidence that Cowes Week will have a new partner in place in good time for the 2009 regatta."

Skandia Cowes Week will this year take place over eight days from August 2 on the Isle of Wight. The event, which attracts about 1,000 boats, 8,500 sailors and a full gamut of celebrities, first took place in 1826 and is the world's longest-running sailing regatta.

Think of a sport. Now think of an Airline.

A nice article in the Independent today about how Emirates have used sponsorship to create a household name in the UK.

As well as title sponsorship of the state of the art stadium for Arsenal football Club in north London, Emirates have added title sponsorship of a roundabout to their list of properties.

More interesting to me than the fact that the Concord Roundabout will now be the Emirates Roundabout is that sponsorship makes up 50 percent of the £150m Emirates spends on marketing, including advertising and public relations. This is up from a spilt of 90% to 10% in favour of advertising.

While the company gives an indication that they are looking for a 6-7 times return on investment, they admit that it is an 'exposure' model of sponsorship, counting logos and then comparing it with how much it would have cost if you had bought that space on television or in the newspapers.

Even for a big player in the sponsorship game, they admit "It's not too scientific, it's a finger in the air type of measurement. But when you sponsor quite a lot as we do, you get more than a gut feeling of whether the sponsorship is doing well or not."

Surely the digital age can bring more clarity than that!

Wimbledon by Numbers

As the champions are about to be crowned for another year at the famous grass courts of the All England Club, time to reflect, not just on the tennis, but the business of the event.

Wimbledon is global brand that made almost £25 million profit after tax last year. The event is watched on television in over 562 million homes in 178 countries. Nearly half a million spectators, paying anywhere from £5 to £60 per ticket, will pass through the gates in the leafy outer suburb of London. And the spending won't stop once they are inside - visitors will buy 17,000 bottles of champagne and 31 tons of strawberries, 100,000 pints of beer and 130,000 lunches.

Sponsors include Rolex, IBM and HSBC - big names who are aiming their products at a global, affluent market and taking advantage of a rare week of sunshine in July for some hospitality and deal making. Some of the sponsorship monies are being used to bring the centre court up to super-modern standards. Work due to be completed in 2009 will increase the number of seats to 15,000 and allow the roof to be closed so rain (which so often delays the event) does not stop play.

And what of the other 50 weeks of the year, well organizers have opened 34 Wimbledon stores around the world, (14 in China alone) that sell everything from logo-bearing towels to diamond-encrusted jewellery. It's a long way from a gentlemanly game in white in 1877.

Sport - The Original Social Network

Networking is the word. social networking, business networking, IP networking, the network effect, the networked economy. Everybody is doing it. Luckily, those who are into sport, know that networking is nothing new. Sport is the original social network.

Sport is a natural way for people to get together. Before Facebook and Linked-In and Yardbarker, there were yacht clubs and golf clubs and football clubs. Before the Internet made connections between profiles, people made connections with fellow participants. A recent study suggests that people who play sport are more successful partly because of the positive Social Network Effect.

For some companies, the only real reason to sponsor sport is to buy access to a network that may otherwise be impenetrable. The Monaco Grand Prix is recognised as much as a place to do business as a sporting event. As Sports Pro magazine put it last month "Nobody knows how much business is actually done on the big yachts and in the rented apartments overlooking the circuit each year, only that it outstrips every other international sporting event."

You might think that you don't need to network - that it is for salespeople and entrepreneurs, Many people find themselves at partner level of a professional firm, where they are expected not only to deliver outstanding service, but also to bring in new business. Even in the age of digital networks that populate themselves out of your outlook address book, it is better to develop long-standing relationships with people.

For those who want a crash course in how to network, help is at hand from the experts (I'm not one of them). Aquitude is one company that shows people, especially in large corporates, the benefits of developing a strong network, and for those looking for an online network with a sporting edge, check out iStadia.

Does Sponsorship Work? Ask Volvo.

I get asked a lot whether sponsorship actually works. Whether it can hold its own against other kinds of marketing spend. Apart from the metrics which show that sponsors can achieve great ROI from this form of promotion, another way of answering the question is to point to companies that obviously believe that it works.

Take Volvo for example. Volvo have taken the Round the World Sailing race and made it their own, with innovative media treatment and professional activation. But Volvo sponsor all kinds of things, so many in fact, that they have launced a website dedicated to their sponsorship activity.

A visit to the site reveals that Volvo sponsor Sport, environmental projects, culture at a global, national and local level. volvoinsponsorship.com delivers news, views, information and results from all points of the compass.

From prestigious professional golf championships such as the Volvo China Open and the Volvo Masters to the worldwide enthusiasm of the Volvo Masters Amateur, the sponsorship portal augments tournament site-specific websites, giving a flavour of the on-course drama, meets the men and women at the centre of the stories with exclusive insights behind the scenes.

Then there is sailing; the Volvo Ocean Race, Volvo's flagship round-the-world race, setting sail in October 2008 on a seven-team, nine-month, 37,500nm, four-continent 10-country, 11-port ocean odyssey sets sail from Spain on October 4th.

The Volvo-sponsored Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and the Gothenburg Opera both strike the right chord with Volvo's cultural campaign and volvoinsponsorship.com will hit all the high notes from the concert halls and opera houses at home in Gothenburg and abroad.

And it's ‘Green for Go,' with Volvo's environmental initiatives, the Volvo Environment Prize, the most coveted ecological award on offer and its junior equivalent, the Volvo Adventure with the youth of the world finding environmental improvement simply eco-logical and the sponsorship portal gets to the heart of the environmental action.

The very best of the rest comes from Volvo's support for Swedish motorsport, burning eco-fuel of course, exhibitions, conferences and awards around the world, equestrian excellence at the annual Göteborg Horse Show, featuring the full sponsorship spectrum from Volvo.

Commented Steven Lefebvre, New Media Manager at Volvo Event Management in Brussels, "The new sponsorship portal provides a global platform with which to pull all the strands of Volvo's various sponsorship activities together."

He added, "With our portfolio of dedicated event-based websites such as volvochinaopen.com, volvomasters.com, volvooceanrace.org, volvomastersamateur.com, volvomastersofasia.com attracting millions of sport-specific aficionados to their in-depth coverage, we are endeavouring to reflect the broader and more diverse elements of Volvo's worldwide sponsorship activity and offer a different perspective for those engaging with us either for the first time or in a broader way."

The strapline for the new site is "bringing sponsorship to life."