Who is going to pay for Britain’s decade of sport? There may be national pride in hosting so many tournaments but they rely on sponsorship and that means unprecedented demands on companies for their cash and goodwill. Are marketing budgets big enough to pay for it all?
England won the bid to hold the rugby union world cup in 2015 because its promises to attract sponsorship exceeding the rival nations’, but it will be competing for corporate backing with a host of other events.
Before the first ball is kicked at Twickenham, Britain will hold the Ryder Cup golf tournament in Wales next year, the Olympics in 2012, the rugby league world cup the following year and the Commonwealth Games in 2014. Whether or not the football world cup comes to England in 2018, the country is hosting the cricket world cup the following year.
And between those major events are smaller competitions, including regular sporting fixtures from weekly football to Wimbledon, the Grand National and the boat race — all competing for the same limited pool of corporate sponsorship.
Global events attract global sponsors, of course, but British companies will be expected to punch above their weight in financing these events — if only to prevent foreign competitors muscling in on their patch. Think of the dilemma for British Airways: the national flag carrier would normally sponsor a big national event, but can it really back that decade-long catalogue of sporting competitions?
And global sponsors are tightening their belts as much as UK companies. Of the 12 main sponsors that backed the Olympics in recent years, four dropped out after Beijing. London is still looking for companies willing to pay to put their names on the 2012 games and it must be questionable whether Lloyds would have pledged its £80m if it had not agreed the deal before the banking crisis.
The Derby only agreed a new sponsor days before this year’s race and top football clubs have seen their sponsors hit trouble: West Ham’s travel company backer went bust while Manchester United shirts bear the name of AIG, the insurer rescued by the US government.
Sports promoters will increasingly turn to those companies that still have budgets but it is not the corporate sector’s duty to finance sporting dreams. Sponsorship is not philanthropy but a marketing tool that must deliver a return on investment. However, over the next decade that return will be harder to achieve because there will be so many competing events with rival sponsors.
The recession will be over by the time most of those tournaments start but a subdued Britain will still be paying for the bank rescues. The events may possibly achieve the boosts to the economy their promoters claim when pitching to bring them to Britain, but companies will be wary for many years to avoid what could be seen as profligate spending. With such a choice of events to support over the next decade, companies really need to develop a model for efficient sponsorship.
(Pic: Steve Punter cc2.0)
