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There has been lots of discussions lately on this forum about the sponsorship of chess in Canada. I would like, here, to provide my point of view on the subject. I think that I am uniquely qualified to provide some light on the matter as I happened to have been able to collect well over 75 000$ in sponsorships for the FQE and the Chess and Math Association.
Companies sponsor events or causes for a multiple of reasons.
First, you have sponsorship that is driven primarily for marketing reasons. We will call them marketing sponsorships. In these cases companies want their name associated with an event because it reaches a large public and that the brand will benefit from being associated with the event. Good examples of this is the sponsorship by IGA of the French t.v. show Kampaï (that promotes good eating habits, clearly in line with the positioning of the food store) or Coca-Cola that sponsors the Olympics. Companies that want to sell equipment of a specific sport will also sponsor events associated with that sport, as it is a good way to reach a target audience interested in the sport. Hence Salomon will sponsor ski events to generate positive brand recognition for its brand among skiers.
Obviously, chess has very limited potential in Canada for this type of sponsorship, the cause: very small audiences (advertisers pay for eyeballs) and limited revenue potential from the sale of products. Even if we were to accept Mr. Hébert’s argument,i.e. that we can make chess prestigious, if nobody watches, understands or cares,chess has little to offer for this type of sponsorship dollars. Totally different story in Russia, of course.
The second type of sponsorship could be labelled “cause sponsorship”. Here companies will sponsor good causes in order to enhance their image as being good corporate citizens (obviously for most of them it comes from a genuine belief that they have a role to play in society). In most cases, the policies of these companies will try to align the causes that they support with their marketing strategies. Competition is fierce for those dollars as good causes to support abound and available dollars are far lesser than for marketing sponsorship. Good example of such sponsorships is IGA sponsoring “Moi je croque” program that promotes good eating habits among school children in Québec or Jean Coutu giving money to St-Justine hospital.
Having access to these kind of dollars for chess is not easy but feasible. Chess needs to promote an angle by which the practice of chess serves a better purpose for society in general – nobody will sponsor chess to ensure that professional chess players earn ever bigger prizes in tournaments! So far, the two best angles I have found, that allowed me to tap funding in this market, are related to the youth market. For example, SAP will promote in the Québec Open because they see chess as a good activity to enhance kids skills in math and science. Bank of Montreal sponsors Larry’s Canadian Chess Challenge because their Québec Chairman, Jacques Ménard, is very involved in strategies aiming at preventing kids from dropping out of school and saw in scholastic chess, a worthwhile activity that could enhance kids relationship with their school.
A third source of sponsorship dollar is what I would call “goodwill sponsorship”. In this kind of sponsorship a company or an individual accepts to give money because it is solicited by a customer or because it wants to give support to an employee who solicits funding for a cause he believes in or other similar reason. For example CN supports the FQE because Richard Cloutier (FQE treasurer) works at CN and CN wants to support its employees’ involvement in their community. When Sobeys buys a table at a gala that benefits this or that fund raising effort, it is usually for that reason.
What distinguishes there type of sponsorships from the previous ones, is that it is the identity of the one who asks that is more important in the decision to grant than the cause itself, although the cause still need to be worthy and beneficial to society in general. Most of the funding the FQE got in the last year was from that category and related to the business contacts I developed over the years as president of Sobeys Québec.
The opportunity for chess in this category lies with solicitors doing it for the cause. Hopefully, once the solicitor is gone, the sponsor will continue to support the cause because, by then, the sponsor will have seen a way to justify the expense for marketing or cause sponsorship. Mr. Hébert seems to believe that this is easy to achieve but I would beg to differ. Solicitors of this nature are not easy to come by and are sollicitated by numerous people who want them to embrace their cause. Ever complaining professional chess players that are not able to express genuine gratitude to these volunteer fund seekers or organizers, tend to be a turn off, both to the organizers and the sponsors. To be successful in this category of sponsorship, a cause has to be as successful at selling itself to solicitors as it is at selling the cause itself.
A fourth category is “local sponsorship”. Here, a sponsor wants to be part of the fabric of the community at the grass root level. A good example is Lawton’s (a local drug chain) support of Chess and Math in Atlantic Canada or the local IGA retailer sponsoring the Lanaudière tournament organized by the local chess club.
These sponsorship tend to involve local retail businesses that will benefit by the patronage from the club 's member. Obviously, the bigger, the more active the club, the higher the chance to get a significant amount. If your event has regional visibility, the merrier and if your event gives provincial visibility to a far away region, you may be able to tap in the natural pride smaller centers have in hosting great events. The success of the Saguenay Open in finding sponsorship in the region can be explained by this factor and by the extraordinary leadership of its organiser Mr. Éric Gravel.
As you can see, finding sponsors for chess is not “cause impossible”, but it is certainly more difficult that Mr. Hébert would make it appear. Special conditions need to be assembled to be successful. It would be preposterous for me to tell the CFC what strategy it should approach to finance its Olympic team or its Canadian Open, but I hope this exposé will help in the process of its development.
Marc Poulin
Opinions expressed we are my own and do not constitute an official position of the FQE.
Companies sponsor events or causes for a multiple of reasons.
First, you have sponsorship that is driven primarily for marketing reasons. We will call them marketing sponsorships. In these cases companies want their name associated with an event because it reaches a large public and that the brand will benefit from being associated with the event. Good examples of this is the sponsorship by IGA of the French t.v. show Kampaï (that promotes good eating habits, clearly in line with the positioning of the food store) or Coca-Cola that sponsors the Olympics. Companies that want to sell equipment of a specific sport will also sponsor events associated with that sport, as it is a good way to reach a target audience interested in the sport. Hence Salomon will sponsor ski events to generate positive brand recognition for its brand among skiers.
Obviously, chess has very limited potential in Canada for this type of sponsorship, the cause: very small audiences (advertisers pay for eyeballs) and limited revenue potential from the sale of products. Even if we were to accept Mr. Hébert’s argument,i.e. that we can make chess prestigious, if nobody watches, understands or cares,chess has little to offer for this type of sponsorship dollars. Totally different story in Russia, of course.
The second type of sponsorship could be labelled “cause sponsorship”. Here companies will sponsor good causes in order to enhance their image as being good corporate citizens (obviously for most of them it comes from a genuine belief that they have a role to play in society). In most cases, the policies of these companies will try to align the causes that they support with their marketing strategies. Competition is fierce for those dollars as good causes to support abound and available dollars are far lesser than for marketing sponsorship. Good example of such sponsorships is IGA sponsoring “Moi je croque” program that promotes good eating habits among school children in Québec or Jean Coutu giving money to St-Justine hospital.
Having access to these kind of dollars for chess is not easy but feasible. Chess needs to promote an angle by which the practice of chess serves a better purpose for society in general – nobody will sponsor chess to ensure that professional chess players earn ever bigger prizes in tournaments! So far, the two best angles I have found, that allowed me to tap funding in this market, are related to the youth market. For example, SAP will promote in the Québec Open because they see chess as a good activity to enhance kids skills in math and science. Bank of Montreal sponsors Larry’s Canadian Chess Challenge because their Québec Chairman, Jacques Ménard, is very involved in strategies aiming at preventing kids from dropping out of school and saw in scholastic chess, a worthwhile activity that could enhance kids relationship with their school.
A third source of sponsorship dollar is what I would call “goodwill sponsorship”. In this kind of sponsorship a company or an individual accepts to give money because it is solicited by a customer or because it wants to give support to an employee who solicits funding for a cause he believes in or other similar reason. For example CN supports the FQE because Richard Cloutier (FQE treasurer) works at CN and CN wants to support its employees’ involvement in their community. When Sobeys buys a table at a gala that benefits this or that fund raising effort, it is usually for that reason.
What distinguishes there type of sponsorships from the previous ones, is that it is the identity of the one who asks that is more important in the decision to grant than the cause itself, although the cause still need to be worthy and beneficial to society in general. Most of the funding the FQE got in the last year was from that category and related to the business contacts I developed over the years as president of Sobeys Québec.
The opportunity for chess in this category lies with solicitors doing it for the cause. Hopefully, once the solicitor is gone, the sponsor will continue to support the cause because, by then, the sponsor will have seen a way to justify the expense for marketing or cause sponsorship. Mr. Hébert seems to believe that this is easy to achieve but I would beg to differ. Solicitors of this nature are not easy to come by and are sollicitated by numerous people who want them to embrace their cause. Ever complaining professional chess players that are not able to express genuine gratitude to these volunteer fund seekers or organizers, tend to be a turn off, both to the organizers and the sponsors. To be successful in this category of sponsorship, a cause has to be as successful at selling itself to solicitors as it is at selling the cause itself.
A fourth category is “local sponsorship”. Here, a sponsor wants to be part of the fabric of the community at the grass root level. A good example is Lawton’s (a local drug chain) support of Chess and Math in Atlantic Canada or the local IGA retailer sponsoring the Lanaudière tournament organized by the local chess club.
These sponsorship tend to involve local retail businesses that will benefit by the patronage from the club 's member. Obviously, the bigger, the more active the club, the higher the chance to get a significant amount. If your event has regional visibility, the merrier and if your event gives provincial visibility to a far away region, you may be able to tap in the natural pride smaller centers have in hosting great events. The success of the Saguenay Open in finding sponsorship in the region can be explained by this factor and by the extraordinary leadership of its organiser Mr. Éric Gravel.
As you can see, finding sponsors for chess is not “cause impossible”, but it is certainly more difficult that Mr. Hébert would make it appear. Special conditions need to be assembled to be successful. It would be preposterous for me to tell the CFC what strategy it should approach to finance its Olympic team or its Canadian Open, but I hope this exposé will help in the process of its development.
Marc Poulin
Opinions expressed we are my own and do not constitute an official position of the FQE.
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