I was at an event at BAFTA recently to hear the secrets behind their enduring relationship with Orange. It was intriguing to hear the Marketing Manager at Orange and other panel members declare ‘sponsorship is dead’. The prevailing mood was that now it’s all about developing partnerships, implying sponsorship has morphed into joint ventures; a shared experience (warts and all) which is opening up a raft of new opportunities. Orange and BAFTA described themselves as insiders in each other’s businesses, contemplating the problems and challenges one another faced (rather than superficial posturing in order to justify investment). Eleven years down the road, the partnership has helped transform Orange from a ‘challenger brand’ to a household name. It has clearly reached a point of maturity where its evolution is now dictated through a consideration of multiple business factors and a deep mutual understanding of the others’ organisation. There was an expectation of continual reinvention and opening up new frontiers within the business to the benefit of the relationship. The Orange Rising Star Award and the 60 Second of Fame elements (both added into the mix of late) all utilised mobile technology and added customer value alongside linked promotions such as Orange Wednesday to create a coherent portfolio around film and encourage customer loyalty.
This sort of thinking seems to indicate that the days where companies just wanted to badge something are rapidly coming to an end. Smarter activation to leverage the culture property is an absolute minimum if the relationship is to endure (especially in an economic downturn where marketing budgets are coming under pressure). Sony has arguably gone even further by creating the sponsorship properties themselves through a process that is being defined as co-production or co-creation. The PlayStation Series facilitated by Shine Communications broke new ground as the cultural product was developed in collaboration between Sony and partners that included the V&A, ENO, bfi, Baltic and Manchester International Festival. The aim of the project was to reconnect with the original PlayStation generation ten years after the launch of the original console and it generated a 10:1 return on spend for the business in terms of the exposure it generated. Highlights included the stunning UVA installation ‘Volume’ in the V&A’s Madejski Gardens, part of their late night programme. The piece responded visually to music and visitor movements. It can currently be seen at the Southbank Centre.
So what is the commercial potential of these tie-ups for the entrepreneurial museum? Hewlett Packard has worked with the National Gallery for a number of years now and the partnership has resulted in new income generation opportunities. A conventional sponsorship relationship originally built on name association and hospitality has transformed beyond all recognition where HP technology is deployed (and more importantly, demonstrated) to enable the gallery to reach new audiences (see Grand Tour in the ‘Inside Out’ post) and support the conservation and restoration process through digital reproduction technologies. A project to digitise the entire collection has allowed the introduction of Print on Demand technology. The gallery can now reproduce any work in the collection for purchase in the museum shop. This has created a new income stream for both parties and HP has seeded the technology into other institutions. To date around 40,000 reproductions have been sold at the National Gallery. HP and the museum have also worked with agencies such as The Partners to develop linked assets such as the Grand Tour which are designed to showcase the quality of HP printing technologies driving PR and sales as well as reaching new audiences.
Most fundraisers will tell you that sponsorship is part of a healthy mixed funding economy; the icing on the cake that allows you to do it bigger and better, or the stuff you would not get to do otherwise. That said, if sponsorship is morphing into commercial territory (e.g. product development in the HP example) do we need to re-evaluate where it sits within an organisation? Will a new generation of entrepreneurs be found within Development and Fundraising departments, charged with identifying commercial joint ventures with corporate partners rather than limiting their ambitions simply to raising sponsorship cash?
The Serpentine has collaborated with Puma recently to create the Reality Bag that is sold in selected Puma outlets and stockists worldwide as well as in the Serpentine store – blurring the lines between sponsorship, R&D and retail (see our related post on retail to explore the emerging trends in this area). Nike 100, a new art/product gallery space has just opened in Beijing and the company has a track record of using artists and designers to remix trainers to create limited editions. Initially these projects were often unlicensed and underground – a form of piracy - but now they are endorsed and legitimate, increasingly seen as a way of extending a products shelf life. Cultural branding, rather than the limited range of sponsorship, is the new kid on the block.
The emerging anecdotal evidence suggests these relationships could have as much impact on the commercial world as cultural organisations. For the first time, the ‘arts’ are being seen as core to business success and differentiation – not something on the margins.
