SPORTS CORRS
PAGE: 16
EDITION: 3
with gillon block
BRITISH athletics spent more last night on one meeting than its total
annual sponsorship income just a few years ago.The Royal Mail Parcels
Games at Crystal Palace had a budget of #350,000 - yet five years ago
the sport could attract only #300,000 backing for a whole year.
The key to the change in fortunes is former European and Commonwealth
hurdles champion, Alan Pascoe, who has struck even more gold off the
track than on it.
Pascoe, at 41, is now one of the most powerful figures in the world of
sports sponsorship/marketing and personality management. His companies'
interests stretch far beyond athletics, embracing the 1990 Commonwealth
Games, 1994 World Cup, Cowes Week, the CBI, the 1992 Garden Festival,
and the management of many of Britain's best-known public faces.
APA, Alan Pascoe Associates, which he launched six years ago, have
just signed a new contract with British athletics giving him exclusive
marketing rights until the end of 1993.
It is a four-year extension to a five-year deal which was shortly due
to expire. When he won the original contract, Pascoe guaranteed to
provide #3m over five years. In fact, they raised nearly #10m. That
successful track record meant that they had to give no guarantees at all
when the contract was extended earlier this month.
''The success of our relationship with both sport and sponsors meant
we were re-appointed without a re-pitch,'' said Pascoe.
His involvement is now worldwide, far beyond the UK arena. The kid
from a Portsmouth council house is rapidly becoming an international
high-flier.
APA have an annual turnover which director of operations, John Perera,
says is in excess of #15m. ''When we began, in 1983, it was about #1m,''
he added.
They handle the affairs of the European Athletic Association,
marketing and selling the rights to the European championships, indoor
and out, and the Europa Cup - a pan-European market with backers such as
Swiss Timing, Coca Cola, IBM computers, and Thomas Cook. They also
represent the major sponsors in Britain of ice skating, swimming, and
table tennis. In London alone, Pascoe employs 42 people specialising in
sponsorship.
West Nally, the company of which commentator Peter West was once head
and which controlled the rights for the 1982 World Cup, is now part of
Pascoe's expanding empire. Now called Pascoe Nally International, they
are the sponsorship consultants for the 1990 Commonwealth Games in
Auckland.
For all his high-profile, egocentric style, Robert Maxwell was unable
to prevent a financial debacle in Edinburgh three years ago, and
consequently candidates were not sprinting to raise cash for New
Zealand.
But Pascoe confirmed yesterday that PNI have already quietly raised
#20m for Auckland (Edinburgh raised less than #7m and many creditors
lost money.) They have signed up a list of blue-chip sponsors including
Auckland Savings Bank, Air New Zealand, British Petroleum, Dominion
Breweries, Kodak, NEC, New Zealand telecom, TV New Zealand and Unysis.
But the biggest advances which PNI have made include selling the
Commonwealth event to Japan - interests such as Nikon, Seiko, and
Toyota. And Pascoe revealed what he described as the major breakthrough:
''The imminent signing of a network TV contract with the USA.''
He confirmed that it has not been easy. ''In the US and Japanese
markets you have to start by telling them what the Commonwealth is, and
then describe the Commonwealth Games.''
A further Pascoe company, US Soccer Properties, has the exclusive
pre-marketing rights to the 1994 World Cup, i.e. everything that happens
before the tournament, but not the arena advertising during matches.
Another wholly-owned subsidiary, Baginall Harvey, is Britain's biggest
management company for media personalities, handling such as Michael
Aspel, Mike Smith, Sarah Kennedy, Richard Baker, David Coleman, Ron
Pickering, and Dickie Davies.
Pascoe confirms that athletics is still the biggest individual aspect
of APA's work. ''But because of the way we have diversified and spread,
the total group income is not dependent on APA or on athletics.'' He is
particularly happy that not only the shop window of athletics is being
backed. Companies like Dairy Crest, McVitie's, and the Post Office are
supporting junior, development as well as coaching programmes which are
not normally viewed as attractive options for potential sponsors.
''It has been a very exciting time to be involved in the sport,'' said
Pascoe. ''We took over when athletics was still controlled by amateur
rules, many of which dated back into the last century.''
But the one-time hurdler is just getting into his stride. If the
ambitious Pascoe gets his way, what has gone before is only the
beginning.
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