Study Shows No Growth in UK Yacht Racing Participation.
March 1, 2010 by admin
Filed under Business, United Kingdom
The British Marine Federation (BMF) has released figures relating to participation in boating activities in the UK. While there was not a lot of fanfare around the report, the numbers give a deep insight into key parts of the industry and should be compulsory reading for anyone trying to run a business around yacht racing and sailing in the UK.
They survey covers 21 different types of beach and boating activities and the general numbers show that there are some increases in participation, but there is no significant change in participation for small sailboat racing or yacht racing. In other words, from a participation level the sport is stagnant with no growth.
What’s even more worrying is that there is decline in participation in the 16-34 year old demographic, balanced out by slight increases in the 35-54 and 55+ age brackets. Diversity is also pretty low with the figures showing the sport to be male dominated and almost exclusively white.
The report finds
- Small sailboat racing participation rate – 0.44% (175K – 266K people) with a best guess at 218,067 participants.
- Yacht racing participation rate – 0.20% (67K – 131K people) with a best guess at 99,049 participants.
The study also shows that 60% of people involved in Yacht racing are members of clubs, but small boat racing has seen a decline in club membership from 50% several years ago to 42% in 2009.
The sport seems to be doing a pretty bad job of marketing itself. Most participants try sailing because they are introduced to it through a friend. In the world of social media, this is an opportunity for those involved in the sport to promote it and keep it alive.
The current trend of major sailing events being paid for out of tourism and travel budgets seems to be justified, with many people trying sailing for the first time on holiday. 0% of people cited seeing advertising or watching the sport on TV as a reason for taking up sailing. 1.4% cited attending an event or show as a reason for starting to participate in sailing.
The reason given for people stopping sailing are also enlightening.
Participation and viewership are not the same. Hopefully there is a larger audience for yacht racing than just the competitors. The America’s Cup should have been the sport’s Ice Hockey gold medal game, but like the participants, people have just lost interest.
For those looking to find sponsorship for UK events or sailing projects, the report has quite detailed demographic information relating to participation at a regional level around the UK.
More information can be found at www.britishmarine.co.uk
Happy New Year. Top 10 stories of 2009.
December 31, 2009 by David_Fuller
Filed under Featured, yachtsponsorship.com
By the time this post goes out via our daily email, Australia and New Zealand will have already left 2009 and the ‘noughties’ behind. It’s been an interesting year and an even more interesting decade.
Thanks to you for reading and helping Yachtsponsorship to achieve huge growth in 2009. I am always thrilled to find out that this site is considered a ‘must read’ by many influentual people in the business, not just of sailing, but sports marketing and sponsorship.
Happy New Year. See you in 2010
Here are our top stories of 2009, determined by the number of times they were read.
- Measuring Sports Sponsorship – ROI? ROO?
- Two More Open 60’s Go Up for Sale.
- Is Yacht Racing a Pretend Business?
- The World’s Top 200 Sports Properties? Did Sailing Make it?
- Where to Spend £10 Million… in Sailing
- Sponsorship Value – The Commerical case for a DOG Match.
- The Changing Face of Yacht Racing. Oman Sail Launches A100.
- Louis Vuitton World Series Shows Promise.
- iShares Cup 5th Man – The Best Seat in Sport?
- Who’d Sponsor AC33?
Your top story not in the list? Let us know in the comments below which was your top story of 2009 and why.
World Yacht Racing Forum 2009 Articles
Over the last few weeks, we have been writing up our insights from the World Yacht Racing Forum. These articles are a combination of notes made during the presentations and other relevant material from our coverage of the Yacht Racing world in 2009. Some of the articles cover an entire session and some have been broken down into smaller pieces. Some of the panel discussions are not covered. LINKS ARE IN BLUE.
Welcome and Opening Comments, Peter Gilmour Event Promoter & Pro Sailor
Keynote Opening Address, Tom Whidden, President North Marine Group
The Commercial Case for Sailing Sponsorship
Panelists include:
- Richard Moore, CEO, Capitalize
- Richard Brisius, CEO, Atlant Racing
- Karin Bäcklund, Director, Global Sponsorship and Brand Partnership, Volvo Car Corporation
- Mark Turner, CEO, OC Group
How Can Sailing deliver Economic, Financial and Branding Benefits for Host Cities and Ports?
Panelists include:
- Maria Moynihan Lee, Festival Director City of Galway
- Christian Feichtinger, CEO, PROFS
- Daniel Calero, Manager, Puerto Calero – Canaries
- Jose Antonio Muñoz, Manager of the Andalucia Sports Bureau, Ministry for Tourism, Trade & Sports of Andalucia
- William Ward, CEO, Clipper Ventures
Leveraging the Sponsorship Deal – How to maximise the Investment
Panelists include:
- Daniel Miles, Group Head Marketing, Puma
- Henrik Sund, Managing Director, Grow AB
- Michael Rasmussen, Chief Marketing Officer, Velux
- Nathalie Quéré, Head of Global Sponsorship, BT Global Services
Tapping into new Media audiences – The Future of Sailing on the Web, in Gaming and Television
Panelists include:
- Ian Taylor, CEO, Virtual Eye
- Richard Simmonds, Managing Director, Sunset & Vine
- Marijn Harinck, Founder, United Games
- Jean-Dominique Lauwereins CEO, Be Tomorrow
- Philippe Guigné, CEO, Many Players
Keynote Opening Address, Michel Desjoyeaux, Multi Vendee Globe Winner
Cutting Racing Costs – How to reduce costs to meet the challenges of today’s economic climate?
Panelists include:
- Knut Frostad, CEO, Volvo Ocean Race
- Ignacio Triay, Director, Audi MedCup Circuit
- Josh Hall, CEO, Portimao Global Race
- Dominique Wavre, President, IMOCA
- Riccardo Simoneschi, CEO, B Plan Marketing
Panelists include:
- Scott Macleod, Senior Vice President New Business Sony Ericsson WTA Tour
- Jerome Pels, Secretary General, ISAF (International Sailing Federation)
- Nick Fry, Chief Executive, Brawn GP
- Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, Chairman, Clipper Ventures
What is the Future of Multihull Racing?
Panelists include:
- Cam Lewis, Professional Sailor
- Franck David, Project Manager, MOD 70
- Mitch Booth, Tornado Olympic Gold Medallist
- Michel Desjoyeaux, Multi Vendee Globe Winner
- Herbert Dercksen, CEO, Extreme
America’s Cup Presentation by BMW ORACLE Racing, Russell Coutts, CEO and Skipper
America’s Cup Presentation by Team Alinghi, Brad Butterworth, Skipper and Vice-President
The America’s Cup, what is the future for the Challengers?
Panelists include:
- Russell Coutts, CEO and Skipper, BMW ORACLE Racing
- Brad Butterworth, Skipper and Vice-President, Team Alinghi
- Paul Cayard, Professional Sailor
- Stephan Kandler, CEO, K Challenge
- Magnus Holmberg, Skipper, Victory Challenge
- Sotoris Buseas, CEO, Greek Challenge
- Marcus Hutchinson, Director, Team Origin
- Nicolo Bastianini, Vice Chairman and legal advisor of Green Comm Challenge
A ‘Birds Eye’ View of the 2009 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race. Live From Twitter.
The 2009 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yact Race promises to be the first where Twitter is used extensively by teams and fans alike. Follow the latest tweets from the offical feed and others…
YuuSail Shows How Digital Changes the Game for Viewing Sailing.
This is a story that brings together some of the biggest themes in current thinking about yacht racing media and sponsorship. It involves engaging people through social and digital media as well as involving tourism advertising dollars and creating stories that non-sailors can get interested in.
First the travel and tourism angle. Tasmanian Minister for Tourism and the Arts, Michelle O’Byrne, has announced a partnership with the ‘Big Boat Racing Team’ for the 2009 Rolex Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race. The partnership will give Tasmania a valuable digital presence and association with some of the biggest names in the online world. The Big Boat Racing Team is headed up by well-known yachting identity, Ludde Ingvall, a previous Sydney to Hobart race winner on two occasions.
So why are Tasmania investing promotional dollars this way?
“This exciting partnership will harness the incredible national and international interest in the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race, and allow Tasmania to promote itself as a vibrant and exhilarating destination to a global audience. Tasmania will have prominent online exposure through logo placement and direct links to Tourism Tasmania’s website from BigBoatRacing.com – the website that will show the live feed from Big Boat Racing Team’s yacht YuuZoo – and via other social media and networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Blogger that will carry live text feeds from the crew.
It’s not just about exposure though. As many sponsors are telling us, this is about engaging certain audiences.
“As part of the partnership, Tourism Tasmania will be giving a young Tasmanian yachtsperson the experience of a lifetime, securing them a berth aboard YuuZoo to take part in the 2009 Rolex Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race. They will be blogging during the race, providing insights about Tasmania as well as what it’s like to race in one of the best-known yacht races around the world. We have also secured a place on board for award-winning international photojournalist, David Liscio, whose credits include National Geographic, Sail and Sailing magazines, newspaper USA Today, and AP and Reuters news services.
Travel is one industry that ‘gets’ social media. At the World Travel Market this year in London, many companies realised the strong connection between the way people buy travel online and make research decisions about where to go based on peer reccomendation.
“The digital opportunity this partnership presents for Tasmania is significant and fits very well with our digital marketing strategy for 2010,” Ms O’Byrne said. Social media interaction is a key component of our digital strategy, and for our industry it is vital that we have a channel to provide direct access to information and online bookings for travel to the state, and this partnership delivers that.
The team has done a deal with YouTube to live stream the race fromm the boat. Working with YouTube, and supported by co-sponsors such as Dell, HTC and Logitech, Maxi-Yacht YuuZoo is aiming to reach 500,000 viewers.
For sailors, the PR is a little confusing. The team aims to “set the record for the world’s largest ‘crew’ in a sailing event by bringing a non-spectator sport into the palm of your hand and to living rooms around the world.” The word crew implies that those watching the various feeds will have some kind of active part in the sailing of the boat, but as far as we can tell, those in the digital world will just be along for the ride.
The team’s facebook page is here…
The dedicated YouTube page is here…
