Some key performance indicators
Designed to last – a case study of Systems by Design
Capturing the leisure buyer – Seasons Holidays

A NATURAL SPONSORSHIP MEDIUM

In common with virtually all sport, racing has seen unprecedented growth in commercial sponsorship over the past five years, and indeed for considerably longer.

Some key performance indicators
In 2007, £7.4m was invested by companies in sponsorship of Jump races alone, taking title to individual events like the John Smith’s Grand National, Smurfit Kappa Champion Hurdle & Hennessy Gold Cup. This reflects a healthy increase of 10.8% on 2006, and in excess of 22% over a five year period.

But the diversity of investment opportunity in Jump racing masks a much larger figure. During the same five years, sponsorship of individual horses or teams has escalated substantially, from £3.68m to £8.36m. The leading stables are now viable sponsorship propositions, illustrated by the current band of sponsors, like Schroders (Alan King Racing), Connaught (Paul Nicholls), Bathwick Tyres (David Pipe) and Jewson (Jonjo O’Neill).

And investment takes many forms, from print advertising to perimeter boards, ticketing promotions and facility sponsorship. The market for Jump racing alone is well in excess of £20m.

Jump racing’s appeal stretches from grass roots local support to major domestic and international events like the Festival and John Smith’s Grand National, which draw in national and international brands. And whilst individual racecourses present their product range to the sponsorship market at large in a fragmented approach, the larger courses staging the premium races are clustering together to present a coherent sponsorship strategy on a more and more frequent basis in order to present cohesive campaigns offering cut-through and longevity. And racing’s excellent geographical spread makes opportunities for companies with a regional or national footprint and customer base easy to deliver.

Examples of these campaigns include the highly successful Jewson Novices Hurdle Series, a campaign of 16 races across 6 months, in which the eponymous firm looks after nearly 1,500 key accounts and impresses the Jewson brand on the racing audience through newspaper and television, and the Pertemps Series, a campaign of 12 qualifying hurdle races concluding at the Cheltenham Festival, running across the UK, France & Ireland.

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Systems by Design has worked within horseracing, being responsible for the internal refurbishment of the Hampshire Stand at Newbury Racecourse, and a luxurious Owners’ Lounge at leading trainer, Jonjo O’Neill’s Jackdaws Castle, north of Cheltenham. Systems by Design uses racing to market its service, leveraging the SBD brand through the media achieved by association, but also through premium hospitality for key clients. Its offices are near to Warwick Racecourse, where the company entertains key current and prospective clients in a private facility refurbished by SBD. In addition, SBD sponsors one of Warwick’s flagship events, the Kingmaker Steeplechase, a prestigious televised race en route to the Cheltenham Festival.

SBD has previously been associated with the sponsorship of all the horses trained in the Lambourn Valley, labelled the “Valley of the Racehorse”. The sponsorship allowed SBD an entrée to key owners, often entrepreneurs or business owners and decision-makers. The racing association offered a head start to introducing SBD to those companies and individuals.

Paul Downing, Group Managing Director, reports, “SBD is currently enjoying a period of annual year on year growth. We believe that our investment to date in Jump racing has assisted in both the development of the SBD brand and the consequent increase in business revenues.”

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Capturing the leisure purchaser – Seasons Holidays
Seasons Holidays, established in 1997, has grown into one of the UK’s leading holiday ownership developers, with 6 resorts in the UK, and 3 in Europe. Membership of Seasons Holiday Club now stands at more than 23,000 British families, representing over 70,000 people, for whom the company arranges holidays each year.

Each resort offers a choice of luxury self-catering accommodation with up to three bedrooms. Seasons Holiday Club is a multi-destination network, where the members collectively own villas, cottages and apartments in the nine destinations.

Whilst Seasons Holidays has owned racehorses for many years, a recent foray into race sponsorship illustrated an appetite to use racing’s affluent market for commercial gain. In January 2007, the company announced a first ever sponsorship of the Queen Mother Champion Steeplechase, one of the four major races at the Festival, and the third most valuable chase in the calendar.

During the first half of 2008, Seasons embellished this initial exposure to racing with two other key planks of its plan. The company now sponsors the only other Grade 1 steeplechase over the corresponding distance, 2 miles, leading to the Festival race, at Sandown Park in December, extending the visibility of the Seasons brand not just geographically to the London area, but in time also, with a 12 month exposure for the brand now among the Jumping community.

The racing sponsorships offer high visibility for the Seasons Holidays brand, playing their part in reversing lingering perceptions of timeshare in the minds of consumers. In addition, the sheer scale of the TV, online and event audiences offer a fertile environment for data capture through media competitions, direct mail and event marketing, to be converted to sale at a later juncture.

Harnessed to this is a broadcast sponsorship with Racing UK, offering data capture, promotional campaigns, TV commercials and online activity over a full 12 months to Racing UK’s audience.

Leslie McCann, Group Marketing Director, Seasons Holidays, comments, “I was new to racing and didn’t understand the connection it makes with spectator and viewer alike. I could never see the entry point for the company. However, our exposure has been considerable, and the impact of our direct mail and data capture campaigns is an immediate positive quantification of our investment to date.”

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Racing UK has acquired betting partners for its afternoon and evening racing, as well as a premium highlights package too. However, through the creation of the Racing UK Club, now the largest club in British racing, with over 50,000 subscribers, it offers valuable data capture opportunities and on screen presence to many more sectors than merely the core betting proposition.

Seasons Holidays, whose programme is outlined above is one such example. But Racing UK has recently acquired a vehicle partner in Jeep. Through its web site, quarterly mailings and monthly reach of circa 350,000 viewers, Racing UK offers Jeep access to a knowledgeable, discerning and affluent market of stay at home racing enthusiasts over a 12 month period.

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