Unofficial Partner Podcast
Unofficial Partner Podcast
UP455 The Buy Side: Why the financial sector spends so much on sport
The Buy Side is our regular series talking with brand side marketers about sport and sponsorship.
Our guest is Richard Deane, who's career includes running sponsorship programmes at Standard Life Investments, Abrdn and Investec across Ryder Cup, British and Irish Lions and many other major sports properties.
The Buy Side is sponsored by the Two Circles intelligence platform KORE. More than 900 brands, venues, and sports organisations trust the Kore platform to manage partnerships and assets and measure their impact with real-time insights. Through Fan Intelligence and Partnerships Intelligence, Two Circle’s Kore platform unites sponsors and properties with solutions that help enhance the fan experience, drive smarter decisions, and enable marketing and operations teams to spend time where it matters.
Learn more at twocircles.com.
Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry.
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Hello. Welcome to Unofficial Partner, the sports business podcast. I'm Richard Gillis. Today is an episode of The Buy Side, which is our regular series talking to brand side marketers about sport and sponsorship. And it's my great pleasure to get my old friend Richard Dean in, whose career in sports marketing for brands such as Standard Life. Investments, which then became Aberdeen, more recently has been working with Investec. And we pick out things like Ryder Cups, Rugby, Lions, Tours, there's a whole load in here, but it's more about the, what the sector as a whole, how banks and building societies and financial advisors have been viewing themselves since the financial crisis of 2008. And how that shaped the way in which they market themselves, how they talk about themselves and how they want to be perceived. So there's a load in here and Richard is great company and is very knowledgeable on this subject. The buy side is sponsored by the two circles intelligence platform core more than 900 brands, venues and sports organizations. Trust the core platform to manage partnerships and assets and measure their impact with real time insights through fan and partnerships. Intelligence. Two circles core platform unites sponsors, and properties with solutions that help enhance the fan experience. Drive smarter decisions and enable marketing and operations teams to spend time where it matters. Learn more at twocircles. com.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:and normally it's a sort of grumpy American financier who,
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:There's never any of them.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:they're the worst. American ones are the, they're the worst ones. I dunno, LinkedIn meets, creators, meets, there's a, it's a strange world
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I, know that you have your own views on this, but just seeing that change, the changes within certain social media platforms and just how people conduct themselves and just the changing dynamics of that is quite interesting. It is, uh, I was looking at it the other day, actually, just as a how often people post outside of saying that they've changed a job or have got a new opportunity. And there's not a great deal that sit behind that.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:I know. You can overthink these things, but I do think that the old medium is the message thing. But it does I change when I'm on LinkedIn, if I try and write something into LinkedIn. It comes out like a LinkedIn post. It's really hard not to appear, like a sort of the classic LinkedIn cliche, you know, of self promotion and thought leadership in inverted commas or trying to make sort of clever points. And it's really hard to be a normal human being in a way that the sort of wherever I write somewhere else, I mean, I'm a professional writer, so I know how to write, but I, it's something that happens. When I get into that world, it doesn't happen on Twitter. I always found Twitter an easy sort of place to be, but there is something about, I don't know what it's to do with. I think, I don't know if it's expectations or whatever, but it's quite
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I'm, I think like with most things that it can be skewed by the perceived or the defined audience that exists within that ecosystem, which is slightly different. It's not like. I use this phrase loosely, but it's not like normal humans in the scheme of things. You know, it's everyone in their business, company, corporate attire and tone, which then skews that. So you're not actually, I think that changes how you then respond and how you, you interact with people in that medium.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:I think it's sort of, it's Instagram for ugly people, isn't it?
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, there's some really good looking corporate,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:you know, politics is show business for
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:there's a lot of good looking commercial and corporate people out there. I don't count myself in that.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, they are also, they're getting better looking as well, you know, the sort of facial tucks and things. I mean, I look at my face, you know, we were saying earlier about, you know, Our relationship with video and putting video stuff out. And it's really hard not to do it and we've resisted it, but we've started to put video out and I look at my face. I think, blimey, I, first of all, I look like my auntie Joyce. That's the first thing,
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:She's a cracking looking woman.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:And yeah, she was the Elizabeth Taylor of Hayes. She married five times. She was quite controversial in her time, but. There is a, and I look, I think, blimey, I no wonder people get work done. If you're on screen all the time, I would be nipping, tucking, Botoxing, getting my teeth, I'll be down, I'll be on, you know, flights to Turkey
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:25 minutes.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:looking for that transition and transformation over the coming months.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:It will, it'll happen as well. I can sort of, I think I can feel already, I will get my teeth done. My teeth are like sort of English teeth. They're in quite good shape, but they're just a sort of, they're the color of a sort of tennis ball. They're like a sort of red, green
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I'm looking forward to the, associated promotions and, uh, partnerships that you're establishing over the coming months as well then.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:I don't know.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Brought to you by. So,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:we should get one thing to, I've known you, we've known each other for a long time and I remember you from your standard life. Sort
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:yes, indeed.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:and Ryder cups and whatever. I want to talk to you all about that and about golf and the rest of it. We better bring up, start at the end and say, well, actually, what do you do now? Cause you are, I see
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah, so.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:that, but just give us
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:What I'm doing now is I've actually moving on post invest tech into, I'm doing a lot more now looking at and building out consultancy advisory brand work. So that's kind of where I am at the moment and a number of conversations and developing a number propositions in that area. Having just come out of being as brand director for the Northern Hemisphere for invest tech. So that's effectively working within the leadership team within that business. I suppose when I first started within Investec, there was the wealth and investment business and the bank, and there were two separate executive teams and working with all of them. But ultimately, with a clear focus on brand, sponsorship, design, production etc. Having exited and left Dugout, Aberdeen and the fun and games of that. I can now talk about it after going through counselling. I joke. I think there's obviously major M& A and changes within that business and came from that environment. But yes, we originally, I suppose, came across each other and worked with each other in an original guise of, uh, standard life investments.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:And that was a long time ago. That was, I remember that was running into Medina in 2012. So that would have been 2011,
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:the 2012 2013 conversation at that time, I suppose you were in the throes of developing and writing a book as well, looking at which, uh, you know, the Captain Myth and the connection with that. And, I suppose what was interesting is at that time was them working on interesting content, writing, and how do you bring and activate sponsorship, which obviously Medina. Yeah. was a particular spike and then it was, well, how do you follow that? And that was when we were coming in as a partner and as a sponsor of the Ryder Cup. But first worldwide partner, I suppose is the context.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:about LinkedIn, but also How AI has changed, how you, so if you just put in something like, you know, into perplexity or into chat you get like the framing of, and what you gotta be careful of is like, it gets well, standard life and write a cup. It gives you a, almost like a sort of complete history of it. Let's just start Aberdeen. Is it was spelt funny, wasn't it? I never knew quite, never quite knew how to, was that from a brand perspective, was that a pain for you? Cause I, it was like ABRD and I should say on Twitter, we put unofficial partner is without the vowel. So it became whether I was led by Aberdeen and I, you know, I want to think I wasn't, but maybe I
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, we were taught,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:It was a sort of war on vowels. Was it a war on vowels within the Aberdeen
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:no, it wasn't. I think the, I think we were talking about this with a former colleague. I think there's only a few of us that kind of have the inside. The inside position of all of this. I think that ultimately, as you, you'll be aware that within most businesses, you face certain challenges and constraints and, uh, and issues there. I think with regards to Aberdeen, obviously it was a post merging standard life and Aberdeen. So it was Aberdeen asset management. I mean, what you do have is a set of considerations with regards to what you can protect, what you can, you know, trademark, et cetera, et cetera. And I think Stephen Byrd coming in as a, well funnily enough in the February of that year I'd already proposed and tabled and had approved by the board a change of the group and the asset manager. But with a new CEO coming in there was a hypothesis tabled at that point in time which was we're going to now call ourselves Aberdeen. but not as you might spell it, or I might spell it. So what I had to do at that point was, and we as a team had to pivot quite quickly to then go through a governance and sense check and interrogate that hypothesis, which was effectively from a senior leadership, executive CEO perspective. So hence why I suppose there's a bit of a false story that, that was, well, Wolf Olin's as a major brand agency came up with that name and title. It was not them. I brought them into the mix to help and support with that governance and stress testing, client testing of that hypothesis and that name. And funnily enough, well, I've always careful about using this as an example. One of the presentation slides, you know, as is always the way with these things, you can't get away from not having a slide. One of the slides was other brands that used, uh, that didn't use vowels. One of which always makes me laugh because it was Grindr was one of them. So, uh, so,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah, because it was in that, there's that sort of I, yeah, I suppose it's sort of grinder and
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Sprinkler, there's all these different, there was a bit of a phase of people removing to be hip, cool. I mean, ultimately, I suppose, the problem that I had faced over the many years was you had companies with massive long names. So the idea of trying to rationalize that and reduce that certainly, I suppose in the realms of sponsorship and applying that to different assets, et cetera, et cetera, that's a great thing to be able to do. But what you do have is that it's obviously you get a backlash with any changes of brands. I mean, inherently. Do people care? Well, they care at a point in time. It gets very kind of emotive, and it's and, but there was a drive to make material change to the business, and I suppose in many ways, Stephen Byrd, as the CEO, was very keen to, to instigate that change, that direction, that movement away from what had been forgotten. Because I suppose with all of these, when you merge major, huge businesses together, it's always a degree, there's degrees of compromise that you're having to work with. And it's not always, if you look at it from my perspective, from a purist brand director, brand manager it, you wouldn't end up in the same place. But that's, that, that's a purist view. And we don't live in a purist society. We live in the real world, which has nuance, personalities, politics etc.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:sort of interesting. It's interesting you say that because you had that sort of moment of tumbler grinder, you know, the sort of that Silicon Valley led, And the question is then, you know, Aging of that idea and whether that's it feels a capsule or whether there is a, you know, it suits the other bit to it, I guess, is that in the more, in the financial sort of realm, there is this sort of, when you list banks and I dunno whether they're just banks or Satires or ba you know, like egg or, you know, it could be just any word. So, you know, we've got one, you know, I think it is called fridge or you know, something like, well. I just don't know what these are and you can sort of see what's happening in the presentation and obviously banks and financial sector has always been seen as a sort of quite a, from a brand perspective, I guess it's all about that it was about trust and about, these big buildings, you know, going back generations, you had banks positioning themselves in a certain way, and I guess the, you know, the internet has liberated them from that a bit. And there is a sort of, is there a desire there to sort of be more modern or represent themselves
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, I don't think, I don't think, banks are unique in that. I think that there's certain unique factors that come into play, but I don't think they're unique in that respect, in that any sector is, I suppose, going through change, new entrance, you know, the technology disruption in those things. I think the challenge with certain banks, and I suppose if you look at like some pensions, et cetera, sometimes some of those purchases are grudged, that they're not particularly passionate. It's not like, you know, it's not like buying a holiday. You're basically looking to put money away and it's all of these kinds of things. So, so there's always been a, I suppose, a bit of a friction there with regards to to, to that world. However. And I suppose there could be a better job done is what they do and deliver possibly that story doesn't get told as well. You know, there's some really good things, but then what ends up happening is rugs get pulled underneath because there's a financial crisis or there's a later scandal or a mis selling, you know, and then you kind of, I suppose from the inside, you're going, Oh, no that's not helpful and you effectively get pulled all together. I love that. But I suppose with all branding is about trying to establish some meaning, so as much as you're saying that, Richard, about banks, you could say the same about any industry. If you're not, if you're not attaching enough meaning to a name, a phrase, a logo, it's all what you put into that pot. So, if you're Barclays, or if you're Lloyds, or whoever, You're trying to establish who you are and what you represent and you'll have a relationship. I think what's changed with banking and financial services is this degree of There was a case point in time when you had only one relationship That's changed and moved on now. So now you've got multiple you so that many people have a their mainstay bank and they'll have a a financial provider of They might use a separate credit card or a separate Bank account for their hip money to spend on things, you know, your, hence why your Monzo's revolutes and start to come into play. So, so I think there's a degree of continuous change there. And I suppose ultimately the other challenge that you exist in modern, in the modern world is just that infinite choice. So, so that doesn't become easy.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:I always think when I wonder if the sector as a whole, they've sort of been apologizing for the financial crisis for a generation. I think it generate, you know, that, that was such a cataclysmic sort of moment. And then the brand, the toxicity of financial, some financial brands You've then seen, and I think that sport has in some ways been a beneficiary of this, in that they've said, right, okay, well, let's, we need to create new stories to tell, we need different platforms, we need different areas that we can, you know, we can't just have people talking about us as the bastard banks who crashed the economy. And that spread across And that's shaped their behavior. And I think I still see it now. I still see, okay. I think that's
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:yeah, well, I suppose if you come out to something whereby you've been impacted negatively and there's negative associations and you feel that as a business, you want to change that to something positive, then you want to attach yourself to positive things, you know, success, you know, all of those sort of things which, so, so therefore you think, well, success around sport and Celebration and positivity and all of that good thing of humanity, you can see why you, I mean, ultimately branding is about what you attach to a company. So, and what you want is positive associations attached to that. They can be quite low resolution is the other thing, and that's the other thing, it's quite visceral sports, so therefore it's quite, it can often be a shorthand to get to that positive association and link, linkage. So I think. When you are looking at, and I suppose sponsorship, the key, one of the key points that I always say to, to teams is that sponsorship's just is one, is a good tool, but it's one tool of an overall set of tactics that you would deploy. Ultimately, you need to decide what you want what's the problem, what's the question we're trying to answer here. And then you have a set, you have a suite, a never ending suite tactics, tools that you can deploy to get you to achieve that objective. So I think I think when it's negative, yeah it's sport certainly a good one, although it comes with risks of failure, as well, which you have to then take into account.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:What I found interesting because quite often this conversation and we know we're guilty of it here. We're in a bubble where people who are listening are in the bubble more or less of sport and so, you know, sport and sponsorship is the conversation. Then when you get to the sort of, you know, you go and work in an advertising agency, for example, and they look at sport and sponsorship very differently and it comes from a different lens and it's a healthy challenge because, you know, it's a challenge to the echo chamber of, people think, you know, sport has the answer to all ills, you know, and I don't, I'm not a believer of that, but I think from a marketing perspective, so a lot of advertising people or brand strategists at agencies or within On the client side are deeply skeptical about sport and they don't want to attach their brand to that. There's a few reasons for that. One is the narrowing or that they're, they feel like there's a. It's going to constrain them creatively. That was what, that was always one argument to say, look, actually, no we've got this other great, big idea, brand idea, and we don't want to have to funnel it through, you know, you've done a tennis deal, you've done a golf deal, you've done a rugby deal. I don't want to have to. deal with that and all the constraints that come with sponsorship. It's all about control and rights and what, you know, what I can and can't do with the logo. Don't want to be part of that. We want to just, you know, break that open and be liberated and just tell different stories. Do you, was that tension alive within the, on the client side?
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:It comes back to that point, I think, on the what are you trying to achieve? And I suppose the key part here is to, to the basis of what you're saying there is what's the start point. So are you starting from a sponsorships, the start, and therefore you're looking at, well, the constraints and because ultimately it's got a unique set of attributes and unique audience and unique elements to it that bring it to life and what we want to do is we need to attach that or try and find the sweet spot between that and us as a brand. Or are you going actually as a brand we need to do this, of which point you're then saying well could sponsorship fit and help support that, which is slightly different. I mean the ideal is that you're starting from the what do we need to achieve strategically where we're trying to get to and therefore how you deploy that. In certain instances, and we might come on to talk about it, is Where does the sponsorship originate from? Is it already preordained and being decided by an executive? Because I've seen all of these happen. You have the purist world of establish a framework, decide what sponsorship it should be, go off and find it or create it etc. And at the other end, you've got CEO has decided on this as a, as an asset. Here you go, brand marketing sponsorship team. You now need to bring that to life. And. Or you have a little bit of a in between, which is we've agreed some or looking at something. Can you help interrogate it and see if it's right? So I don't necessarily see it as a restriction. I think it's just from a start point. I think from a client point of view, you wouldn't ideally be coming at it from the we're going to have to start from constraints. It would be and in many cases. I don't see it as a constraint because I think it, you would ordinarily have some degree of positioning. So, use a really, I suppose, hackneyed brand of Nike. You go, right, well, we now need to bring Just Do It to life in this context. That you're not really restricted by that. The issue will be more around you've chosen the wrong sponsorship. That's the real concern. You go, oh no, how are we going to bring, Tiddlywink, sponsorship and, you know, and Milton Keynes to life or, uh, and how are we going to connect that to international investment? That, that's, I'm being slightly flippant, but I think the sponsorship is a problem. I don't, I think that I would never come at it. We've generally, I've generally seen it as a, it's reset budget expectations and actually ambition for business. So it's helped. from an internal culture perspective. The tricky bit then comes with, we've got an established brand platform or campaign, we now need to unpack that and bring that to life. But then that's what you would then bring in, funnily enough, an agency in to, to potentially help support you on that. That's where their creativity comes in to connect the two.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Let's get to golf then. Cause decision, I remember at the time. So, and it was standard life at the time it was Ryder Cup. just take us through why Ryder Cup. And then there was a global deal because the Ryder Cup is, and people listening may know how complicated it is to sponsor, but it is one of the oddest shaped Sponsorship properties in terms of the ownership of it. It's three days, every two years in different continents. And beyond that the sort of who is the rights owner is a PhD in it. So it was anyway. So just take me through what, why, and just give
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:So, so the history of that where it started from was in in around about 2008, 2009, the business had gone through a full rebrand. So that was the life business, Standard Life and Standard Life Investments, the global asset management business. I was working within the global asset management business, so Standard Life Investments. So we'd gone through the full rebrand. We had put out a campaign and we effectively working with CMOs and Nuala Walsh and ourselves as a team felt that there was a missing piece in the jigsaw, which was a sponsorship, something to effectively bring that campaign to life and change the move the dial from a brand point of view. And so therefore, myself and it was Martin McGovern at the time, we then started working through effectively a filter. So how do you create a framework for what that sponsorship needs to achieve? And it also led me to then introduce the business and vice versa through Charlie, who we were talking about former connection into the engine group. So Carsten Toad and Dominic Curran and the team there, we sat down with them to create and help frame this. One of the key parts that we wanted to achieve, because a big play for a standard life investment was always about teamwork. It was never around the staff and manager within that business. It was always about the collective. So, So, as part of that, you then start going down the lines of, well, what could that sponsorship be? Well, it could be Davis Cup, but you know, it's the kind of team. Could it be that? Could it be, we create a team. Actually, that was one of the things that was tabled at one point was let's create a team of elite athletes in different sports. However, some of these routes come with a lot of heavy lifting. You need to do a lot of work to create something like that. And you need to do a lot of work and spend a lot of money to get any cut through and any visibility of that, you know, come and look at the standard life investments team. That's quite a hard ask for most of the population. Why would I be interested in it? And it was one day I was driving into a meeting with executives and got a call from Carsten. And we were chatting about this and he said, well, what about the Ryder Cup? And we kind of laughed at that time and said, cause the budgets and how, and you know, cost, et cetera. And the perception of that was just like, nah that's just impossible. That'll not happen. But what it did lead to is an initial conversation. So with the European tour. So I suppose to your point on how this starts to then. Unravelers to when you start opening the Pandora's box to find out what you need to go through But we started then the conversation of the European tour as was then DP world now and The European tour we you then quickly discover that well first off great. We've started the conversation We think it's it could be a potential fit And they were quite keen to make sure that they had the right fit. There was a gap in financial services for them as well. So that helps because you're there not competing. So there's category exclusivity, which many of your listeners will know was, can often be a stumbling block as well. You know, you can often get into quite heated debates on that. And I'll come on to talk about one particular that arose further down the line. But when we started talking to European tour We then stated because we had a U. S. business and operation and we had more of a global footprint We then said great. We want to also activate in the U. S. But at that point you then find out that how the Ryder Cup operates is when it's in Europe The European tour own all the rights around the world excluding North America The PGA of America owned all the rights in North America on that cycle. When it's in the US, the PJ of America own the rights around the world, excluding Europe. So to effectively get worldwide partnership and worldwide coverage every two years, you need to put an agreement together with the PJ of America and the European tour. And what's made even more complicated in the US is you then have the dynamic of the PGA tour Which is different to the PGA of America and the USGA. So they all operate their different competitions So I suppose for everyone on the listing PGA of America operates the Ryder Cup and the PGA Championships. The USGA operates the US Open and then you have the Masters and the and, and and Augusta and they operate there. So You've got this, you then have to basically create a ying yang agreement to combine the two. But going back to my point on categories, when you start to try and lock down financial services categories in the US with the PJ of America, We wanted insurance. That category for them is massive, funnily enough, healthcare. It was one of those that we were trying to secure. That was never going to happen. Oh, well, it could happen if you're going to pay the right amount of money. So when you get into contract negotiations, what you find, what you begin to find, and this is, I think, I suppose, can be a frustration from a sponsor's point of view, you end up with the nuance of all these organizations and you effectively get in a tripartite. So rather than dealing one to one, you're ending up with It's three, and then one party's trying to protect their interests over another, and it's just that nuance, and you've seen that pan out with, you know, with Liv, with, you know, PJ2, DP World, you know, et cetera, and that continues to evolve. So that was where we landed. we ended up, well, one day, having a meeting, and then got told, how do you fancy being the first worldwide partner? And we kind of, Kept our enthusiasm and excitement and interest down and obviously, it depends on the price, but yes, that was, uh, that was an interesting point in time.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:so that, and that complexity is interesting. You mentioned live because. When you transpose that, that's a sort of micro example of the. Sport itself, isn't it? Because it's a really complicated sport, multiple rights holders. And when you then, you know, the current Vogue for, so let's, you know, don't talk about private equity specifically, but they look at sport and say, there's inefficiency and they see complexity. If you can simplify that, you can consolidate. Cost, and you've still got, you know, a large fan base of people who are interested in theory, that all makes sense. But what you then went through and, you know, on a, just on a single deal, albeit a significant one is sort of a microcosm of trying to get golf. And you see the same in rugby. People go into rugby or people go into golf saying, I see, you know, we'll, we will do a deal with America, you know, we'll capture the American golf market. You think, well, good luck with that because. You know, one, it's going to be expensive, but it's insanely complicated in terms of the ownership of it. And there's a sort of charm to that, but there's also rubs up against the sort of vogue for simplicity and simple lines. Quite often investors want, you know, just straight lines and we need. Uh, this to be sort of simpler.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:yeah, I mean, there's a set of controlled elements, isn't there? I mean, you've got, you've effectively got, and I've been thinking about this recently actually, is that and all these sports are slightly different of this revenue generation and cost, and as you say, you're coming in going with simplified. So if you look at the revenue s so take golf as an example. The other thing that we ran into was the rights of the players was afforded to you by the European tour contract. Whereas, for any imagery of US players, that required you to do a separate deal with their management and with those players. Now that's changed, and I think you've highlighted on one of your recent calls, was the changing of the payments to players in the Ryder Cup. But, at that point in time, when we, so the first Ryder Cup we sponsored was Gleneagles That's why we did the deals with captains because you were running into, Oh, it's fine on the European side, subject to certain criteria, you know, three players, two players, et cetera. But you couldn't use the imagery of the U S players, which makes it quite difficult. So, so I think the dynamics of all of the layers, as you say, of administration management, the, you know, whether it's in rugby and unions, et cetera, et cetera. Everyone, I always use the phrase from the Godfather, everyone's wetting their beak in some way and there's this kind of waterfall and what you discover as people listening and anyone involved in it is once you uncover and get into a particular sport, you realize how it's operating and for me personally, I went and you go in as a fan, I was a fan of Ryder Cup. And then it becomes work and it's different, but that drive of revenue, control of costs is a key part of that.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:It's interesting you mentioned the captains, because obviously I, again, I, it's not about me, but I did it really, that period, and I saw sort of up close what the running from, you know, Medina into Gleneagles the role of the CA I started to see the captain's job differently, and I saw it through the lens that part of it is the commercial simplicity that it offers. And we're seeing it, you know, and if you extrapolate that out. You look at football manager, the rise of the football manager, for example, is a sort of analogous because actually in a complex stew of stuff happening, actually the leader becomes the easiest story to tell. And you say, right, okay, well, let's, and I remember going to New York with you and we were talking to Darren Clark and Davis Love, who were the respective captains there. And. It made perfect sense from a commercial point of view, because they sort of represent all of the various bits of the story that you want to tell. And I, I have sort of since, and obviously I then, the, my book, it's interesting, my book, because it was written, it published in 2016. It gets referenced a lot, it was in the Times last week. Where every time there's an interview of Ryder Cup Capture, I think it was an interview with Luke Donald. And there's always a paragraph saying, Richard Gillis is a
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I've got it here. Hold on. Just for everyone.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:of, you know, and it's blown up to me. I am, you know, a skeptic as to the value of leadership as a thing, you know. And obviously if you call your book The Captain Myth, then you're going to have to expect that sort of thing. But I am always used as a sort of counter to, the captain is the all seeing. Sort of controller of events, which again, I think is pretty much bullshit, but the Ryder Cup is a particular, you know, uh, area where it comes into that leadership story. I think it's quite an interesting because of the nature of it, the usefulness of the captain, you know, a year out all of the moments that you can use. Take me into the sort of how you viewed the captain's
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:the captain, when you're looking to try and attach it you need people with, to tell your story, to tell the stories. You know, we had framed the sponsorship around at that time. It was around what we need to do for the brand, what we need to do for client, what we need to do for the internal people. And you plan accordingly. Within the brand was, well how do you tell that story, how do you bring that story to life? So you look at, well actually who we are as a business, so therefore actually data analysis was one. So we ended up going down that route. So hence why we had the additional people. So you end up with a roster of individuals to help bring that to life. The captains were one part. So leadership is an inherent part for business. You know, that's, it's not really surprising. And then the likes of Bob Rotella from a psychology perspective and bringing that to life. And yes, he, I mean, his golf shot in our content looked terrible, but he could certainly hit a straight ball. It was actually quite surprising. It's quite an agricultural swing, but yeah, I don't know. It's the psychology of it.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:When it gets around to actually hitting a ball rather than thinking about hitting
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:to talk to, and then like some Matthew Syed's and his perspective. So it was trying to get perspectives and to help bring these elements to life. But use the captains also as a common thread to tie that all together. Because they were inherently leading the decisions they needed to make. It's quite interesting when you get into it. And some of them take it above and beyond. I think when you first got involved, we had the interesting conversation with Sam and Curtis. Which was quite interesting where Sam was just basically going, Why did you put Tiger out last? It was just a ridiculous thing to do, type conversation. And then you have and then Darren and Davis are quite different characters as well. So, you they were closer to, because they were going to be the captains for Hazel team. So that, they, rather than Sam and Curtis were former captains who had played against each other. So, so I think when we got to New York, it started to get closer to the action and bring that to life. And I think. You need some relevance and connection, and it's always inherently for a brand, you're trying to create realistic, I mean it's again, everyone talks about authenticity, but it needs to be some, it does need to be an authentic link, and I think the captains did that. We subsequently also did then it got into the eyes of the British and Irish lines, and you're in a similar situation with regards to how do you tell that, story through captains and leadership. I think commercially. What you find is there's an interesting dynamic that goes between three areas in most sponsorships. You have the captain leaders of the relevant sport or sponsorship that you have, so you have them, so the coaching staff that get, who are focused on performance at the end of the day, you know, the actual sport itself. You've got a PR team that's helping to manage the narrative around the event and the activities that they're undertaking. And you've got a commercial team that's Seeking to deliver on the rights that have been afforded to the partners and sponsors. And there's an inherent friction depending on what happens on the pitch, on the course, whatever, between those three. Suddenly, you've got the team aren't performing, the PR are now going, Oh no, we've got to, everyone's now going, you're really crap, this is terrible, you've made the wrong decisions. Funnily enough, the players or the people involved, they're no longer really are that keen to do a marketing activation and a brand activation for you because they're currently getting battered by the coaching team. So there's always that tension that exists.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah. Yeah. I remember there's a guy, Mark
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, Mark was our data because he did a strokes, strokes game. Yes. So funnily enough. He's, occasionally there. I haven't he
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah. I do occasionally on, and he's, and as you say, he was sort of the creator of Strokes Gain, which has become the currency on the tour. And that again, you've, so you've got the data bit. And I always remember we had a dinner at, I think it was at Glen Eagles where It was Torrance and Curtis Strange. Curtis Strange I always expected not to like because of, but
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:He's a great guy, actually. He's really nice.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah he's really funny and great stories, but also, because you sort of come through the lens of he was always the enemy, you know, Curtis Strange is the one we feared him. And the other guy I really liked Who I met was Lanny Watkins, who I wasn't expecting to like at all, and Ray Floyd. So there were three people there that I thought, Oh, you know, I'm obviously not going to hate these people, but I ended up thinking I was
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Well, I think the U. S., yeah. I mean, the U. S. players, and I mean, they're generally, from a media point of view, they're always quite well, well polished and really come across really well. And I think It's a funny world, I mean golf as you know, anyway it's a strange world. In fact, funnily enough, in Hazeltine, I ended up in a golf buggy with Bob Rutella to pick up his wife from the clubhouse and the Americans were about to win. And I ended up picking Curtis up with his wife at the same time and strangely, I mean, that was two years later. He then goes hi Richard. And it was really funny. In fact, the funny story from that one was we also did we would do working with the golf coach as well. In terms of putting coach for the Europeans. That you'll know. So, And it was the pressure of, because he works with so many, and I think I made, I asked him the wrong question, which was, you work with about eight of the 12 players, do you feel a personal pressure, and putting such a huge thing in the rider car, and on this course, do you feel personal pressure on the success or failure of Europe? And he was like, F in hell, Richard. I think that's, it's like, yeah,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:to make a living.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:But no, it was interesting.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:The, you see, you know, the data question, because again, there's that area has, again, when you look at it from the sort of lens of, Sponsorship and sport and commercial the stories that you know you can tell and you see it you're right in rugby You've got this sort of sage in the we're talking about in the uk perspective, but they've come in Done a broadcast deal around that with and I think it's sportable data. They're using You know, it's in the ball, but there, everyone is looking at interesting ways of using that information. And I always think it's quite a challenge sometimes because actually, and it's evolved, it's an evolving thing and the early iterations were a bit clunky and now they're getting better, but there's a question about, it's the sort of creating a role for. That is appreciated and is not just a sort of necessary evil. You know, you give money and you're just part of the furniture. There's actually a role to play. And what do you think about that in terms of how, where, and when it works? And I see some uses of that. And obviously McLaren and people like that have really, you know, gone to town in terms of recreating their brand as a tech brand and allow companies to come on and project onto that. But you can see sports properties wanting to do that.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:thinking in that area.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I think the, effectively talking about the additive of the brand into that sport and what it can do. I suppose it's ultimately, you're ideally looking for partnerships here and looking at common Commonality. I mean, ultimately, I mean, in certain cases, you might get, it becomes quite transactional. I'm going to buy it and get my logo on it, but that's kind of, that's, I think those are fewer and far between. I think people are still realizing that, although it does come with a cost and an implication, but I think more and more trying to inherently integrate again in a way that adds that value. I mean, ultimately, as a sponsor, you're buying into that. Sport team, whatever it is, based on the fact of the audience that has. Either it's a existing client base and actually you've got a retention piece and you want to do something, or you're trying to grow your market. Now if there's not an overlap, then there's a bit of a problem. I think where I come at it, I'll come at this, I suppose, initially from a brand point of view. There's a commercial element to this as well in that, you know, you know, you've had other people on talking about, you know, you're shifting product and ultimately it's a sales driven. I think the commercial part of the, where you get to the arrangement and the deal that you do. I think what you're ultimately wanting to do is one part of that will be shift the product. There's a commercialization of that thing. but there could be some collaborative development there. So by that I mean a good example of that would be if I take the example of Investec looking at the banking world more in SA there was a great deal of work done to look at the commercial the ability to service and service players and be able to bank them and support their financial needs and they've obviously got business interests outside of that so that becomes quite an interesting area. In the same way as conversations, they didn't quite get to full fruition, but conversations with some of the clubs on the connection with their business clubs. So ideally, I think where what I ultimately I think would be great to see would be, I always put it that if you're working with a club in a particular area, let's say it's take Leicester as an example, you've got that as a conurbation. And ideally as a bank business that helps to grow and develop businesses. What would be great would be if invest tech helped obtain, build sponsors for the club which would then become a sustainable model rather than we're just going to take our money and then go later. So that idea that actually you could intrinsically link it to in that instant. banking, which is quite a tricky one sometimes in banking and development and business, It becomes quite a nice fit. I think that's something that should be continued to be looked at. I think the tech world, that will always be a key part, you know, as you say, certain sports lend themselves to that. But we'll probably touch upon, I know, another one of the areas that you're looking at is that purpose led, so how can you as a business come in and actually enhance and benefit. Because you, I've always loved the lines phrase, which was, you know, that the classic phrase of always leave the jersey in a better place than when you found it. And I think that's always what I've experienced from the sponsorships that we've done. We've always tried to move the sponsorship on and with sponsorships that I wasn't involved with. Another example would be Investec sponsorship of the Derby, you know, it's always been or women's hockey, et cetera. It's always been with a view that. Actually, we can benefit the overall sport as well as getting the benefit for being involved as a sponsor.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. The, uh, the Lions is a good example of this in terms of the, that team
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:that was the other reason why we
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:And again, Yeah. And you get to quite easily into areas like, you know, DEI. So that's under fire at the moment. So, you know, in the States, so you've, they've gone to war over diversity and inclusion, which, you know, And I think it's quite, we're quite an interesting moment. And sport is a sort of adjacent to this and it's coming at sport quite rapidly, but that politicization of that, and it'd be interesting to see how it spreads. And already you're seeing some company, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Nike coming out and saying, no, we're happy with our DEI, you know, we're standing next to our, you know, this is, you're not going to bully us into this. And you've got. You know, activists, sort of Robbie Starbucks type characters who are going after Harley Davidson, you know, and trying to sort of shareholder activists who want to just attack businesses because they're being seen as putting diversity and inclusion, you know, front and center. We're at an interesting moment and what happens, we're not going to second guess it. Sport has sold itself to a large extent on that, or some sports have. You know, in terms of it's, this is what we're about. These are brand purpose platforms that you can then activate around. How do you see this evolving? I'm not asking you to predict the future DEI because it's, we're in a moment, but certainly I hear some stuff that I wouldn't have heard a year ago, particularly around women's football is an interesting one. So women's football or the women's lions, for example, people just bracket that as a DEI initiative and are then aggressively trying to take it down. So it's quite, you know. It is, it's there and it's certainly going to grow and that will spread. And there are people that want to use this just to, for their own purposes, et cetera. But just from a sponsorship perspective, how do you think it's going to
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I think I think from a sponsorship point of view, that they'll, I suppose one point is there'll always be people that will use and leverage these these challenges, these changes, these cultural shifts in a way that will benefit them. So I suppose there's that part. I think from a sponsor's point of view, I think, again, from my experience, I think the likes of ESG, whatever you label you attach to it, you know, environmental, social and governance, that how you operate as a business of which you've got a number of these elements play a part, that has continued over years and years to become far more important, intrinsically linked and embedded within businesses anyway. Now, some businesses have told that story really well. Or use sponsorship to do that. Others just do it because it's the right, right thing to do as a good corporate citizen, commercial entity. Now where I think sometimes it gets, it's from a sponsorship perspective where it gets muddied is that you're trying to do two things. What, so you're trying to do, we're going to change purpose, but we're also doing a brand and we're also doing commercial. It's the classic. It's Internal, I would use it as the agency brief, that it's the and in a brief, rather than something very specific. So I think you really, my view is that you need to be really clear on what you're trying to achieve. And have conviction in what you're doing as a business. And be happy that certain elements of what you do will be commercial or driven by brand. It doesn't all have to be on a purpose led. But what you can't be doing, I suppose. Many companies just don't want to be seen to be, yeah, pouring poison and water streams and doing all of that. So I think the, you need to follow through on this. I think women's sport as a whole is obviously in growth mode. You know, there's the Women's World Cup coming up with the rugby, the women's football, the investment in some of these and the push, which is great to see. And I think where it becomes. The getting involved in the politicizing of that is usually through others, not necessarily the brands themselves. What you do need to do is be ready for those questions to be raised though, and to be able to respond accordingly. I think I've seen, so I suppose you know, the conversation you had with Unilever was interesting, you know, that where the, you know, you've got the dynamic with FIFA, you've got, you know, SailGP, you know, with their deal with Emirates Airline, you know. If you look at fossil fuel usage, you've got huge fossil fuel usage in motorsport, funnily enough. But I think the fourth largest is cycling, which seems slightly bizarre in one respect, but in another. So, so I think having positive change, I think, is how I would frame that. And actually going into these things. Now. Do you have it at the forefront of your mind when you go in? I think as a sponsor you need to be mindful of is that a main driver of the reasoning behind your involvement? Or is it one of the reasons? Or are you doing something else over here that actually satisfies that need? So it just, I suppose be careful I think brands need to be careful they conflate these things and try and achieve everything.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:it's also the yeah, absolutely. It's well put. And it also, the, it will test their resolve, you know, and, and the accusation was always that, you know, Oh, this is virtue signaling, which is always the phrase. And in some cases it probably, it might be, and it was, and, you know, if the question is, What do you actually believe in what you're standing up to do? Then great. I want to live in that world. I, you know, that was always, that's always the question in terms of the
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:Yeah,
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:of the
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:so, so to be able to stand there and be totally, absolutely no issues whatsoever, don't look here as a business, you know, without someone interrogating every aspect of what you do. It's, it shouldn't be seen. I don't think it can be seen as a point. It's not just one point in time. It's an evolving and developing piece for businesses to do everything all at once. Otherwise, we'd be at net zero. Now, rather than in twenty, these, some things just can't happen as an example. Immediately. However, there are certain things that can. I think the decisions you make, the things you say, that's a point, that's a now. And you and you need to stand by that.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Mentioned ESG, which is really interesting. Again it's part of this conversation, which is that even, you know, the story of the last few years has been ESG. The investment community is, using its levers. Sponsorship is just a downstream impact of that. a downstream effect. And so actually that will determine the behavior the behavior of rights holders. So football will get its act in place. If it wants sponsorship from big companies, rugby, golf, tennis, the rights holders would need to take in the environment. They need to be seen to, uh, for the procurement of sponsorship. It's driven by ESG agenda. And that's how you're going to need to behave. So representation on the board, all of those questions are falling in line, but the big story is that the money is determining where this goes. Cause that's going to impact on how brands sponsor it. That was sort of the narrative of last one of the, you know, of the last decade. Do you think that's changing? Do you think that's under pressure or do you think that's going to,
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I, I, I think there's a degree of money talks still. I think ultimately it's money in action, I think, you know, which can be intrinsically linked. I think the the other part for me is just as a, again, coming at this from a spons, sponsors point of view, and a brand point of view, getting involved in something, you can, there's ways of holding rights holders to account on some of these things as well, so you can actually contract within that. You know, if it doesn't meet these criteria, if these sort of things change, You know, there's ways of doing that. It can get quite complex and difficult, you know, you need the right round, right measurement, KPIs, et cetera, et cetera. But you can have that put in place so that you can exit, so that you can stand by what you actually hold dear to yourself. But there is a degree of, I suppose going back to the downstreaming of the investment, I suppose in many ways you've got certain, you know, large investors investing in some of the companies and there's the private equity businesses that are actually feeding into to these that can influence it. I think with ESG, if you look at it from an investment point of view you've got, basically you've got the two choices, haven't you? You can either invest in something and affect change from the inside, or you can remove your funding and hope that affects the change through them not having the money. And people adopt different views, which is that's where ESG gets quite complex is that it's not always black and white. People's decisions in some of these things, you know, there was a really, I suppose, a striking one for me back from investment days, which was we want to stop child labor. So let's take a look at that. We want to remove child labor. By doing that immediately. What that meant in a particular country was that it was moving children into prostitution. So it became this thing of how do they actually attain money? So you have to be very careful about the decisions you're making because the ramifications aren't always visible. And I think that's the bit for you want to go in as a sponsor with your eyes open and make sure that you're protecting the reasons why you're there and holding the rights holder as much as you can to account with, through your contracting. So it needs to meet these criteria, you need to move this we're going to develop a new initiative for A, B and C as part of the agreement. It just needs, it just takes more time and effort is the consideration, which is the right thing to do.
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:yeah, 2012 was an incredible moment. You've gone through Ryder Cups and Lions tours and various other sort of things in, in in various sports. What stands out as the, as the moment?
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:I suppose with. Two or three Ryder Cups, One Lions Tour, Champions Cup Scottish Opens etc. My first foray actually was in in Loch Lomond, the Loch Lomond, the forerunner to, to the Scottish Open back many years. I think I would have three, I think the, I think Rotorua. The Lions Tour, before it actually kicked off, funnily enough, was kind of one pass, but the Lions Tour as a whole was just, as a fan experience was one. I think the Ryder Cup in Hazeltine was actually, as much as people say, oh, it's the American, and it'll be interesting to see how Bethpage is going to be on a different level, but but for Hazeltine being. Experiencing and with Medina experience. I got, I really enjoyed the kind of the banter and the, uh, the atmosphere that you get from an American sport. And then the champions cup final actually last year was a particular note as well. I had to work with a brand that had an icon of a zebra. Changes things totally when you've got people sitting on it or carrying it around. So, so I think from a brand point of view that's that's that's been some of them. Dress I would never recommend dressing up in golf gear and going to an American football game. That was my other learning that I've had Vikings
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:So we're getting the real, we're getting the real stuff there. It's interesting the, uh, Investec Zebra, cause I always remember them at Lords, you know, this is before your time with the brand, but the cricket sponsorship, the ECB, and sometimes I, When we think about sponsorship, you have sponsorship conversations. People forget the big idea, you know, the big moments, the big primary colors. A zebra at Lord's and there's a sort of everything else is, you know, they can do loads of clever things on digital. They can do all the stuff that sponsors, you know, activations or whatever, but actually getting the right rights and staying there is one, you know, longevity. I think people sort of gravitate towards that. There's a power relation, power statement about sponsorship, which.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:It's a very good thing, I would say. I think it was the one thing I hated about having, where you've got a name like Standard Life Investments with a number of characters and, uh, it's quite, you don't have that. Investec does have that. I think what I would say is get the basics right and do them well. I think that sometimes that's, delivers, that can deliver in spades. And yeah. Make use of in creative and fun ways. That's the one time when sponsorships should be fun, especially in a sport So make use of that and actually play with it I think playing with your brand codes as it would be referred to is certainly something that every brand should look at doing against their sponsorship
richard_1_01-29-2025_100613:Every brand should have a zebra. There's your end line.
squadcaster-2jg7_1_01-29-2025_100613:don't do that because they should keep that unique someone could come up with something else Some other striped animal.