Sponsorship Spend Up 14% on 2010 Reveals ESA Research

The European Sponsorship Association (ESA) has announced an 14% increase in its annual figures for the size of the European sponsorship industry. Much of the upturn reflects the Olympic Summer Games hosted in London and the European Championships held in Poland and the Ukraine with sponsorship monies entering the economy in the build-up to these events.

ESA’s figure for the value of the 2011 European sponsorship market is €26.5 billion - a 14% increase on 2010’s total of €23.3 billion.

The uplift year on year was not across all markets with understandable downturns reported in Greece, for example. Other markets remained static as the economic conditions prevail. However, Europe has benefited from being host to major European and Global events with figures expected to remain buoyant for 2012 as the full effect of hosting London 2012 and the UEFA European Football Championship is seen and with Sochi due to host the Olympic Winter Games in 2014.

ESA’s figures cover all forms of sponsorship, excluding activation, for sports and non-sports across the 50 European Countries. The ratio of sport to non-sport sponsorships is 67:33 a growing trend.

ESA used its network of European sponsorship associations, key agencies and members across Europe to derive individual country data.  Underlying are figures from Repucom & Sport+Markt’s SponsorGlobe which provides details of fees paid for sponsorship rights.

Total Sponsorship 

2010 2011

Europe Countries               €22.8b                        €25.2b

Pan European events         €0.5b                          €0.7b

Global Events-Europe         €0.03b                        €0.6b 

Total                               €23.3b €26.5b 

To clarify the data, the following factors should be taken into consideration:

• Sponsorships and events taking place in specific individual European countries show spend of €25.2 billion (€22.8 billion in 2010)

• Pan European events which cross boundaries have been shown separately, as spend is attributed by sponsors differently across their European networks.  Specifically, the 2011 figures take into account the UEFA European Football Championship 2012 partners, the UEFA Champions League sponsorship spend, among other European events

• The Global Events – The Europe figure takes into account the hosting of the:

• Summer Olympics in London with both local (allocated over two years) and TOPS deals (allocated over four years)

• Winter Olympics in 2014 in Sochi with TOPS deals for a four-year period up to the event

• FIFA World Cup global deals only as a proportion to Europe as the previous and next events are not hosted in Europe