NEW DELHI: Sports other than cricket are driving the growth of sports sponsorship in India, which now accounts for more than 10% of all advertising expenditure, according to a new report.
In Sporting Nation in the Making, produced by ESP Properties and SportzPower, the value of the sports sponsorship market – including ground sponsorship, team sponsorship and franchise fees, player endorsements and on air (but not such things as gate receipts, player fees, prize money, merchandising and subscriptions) – was put at Rs 51, 854m ($798m) in 2015, which represented 12.3% growth on the previous year.
On air accounted for just over half the total (52%), with team sponsorship and franchise fees taking a further 20.2%, ground sponsorship 19.9% and player endorsements 8.0%.
The fastest-growing area was on-ground sponsorship, which increased 29.6%, from Rs 7,948m in 2014 to Rs 10,305m in 2015. Cricket continues to account for over half the spending here but its share has dropped seven percentage points to 51.4% as other sports have attracted Indian fans.
The most significant of these is football, where on-ground sponsorship almost doubled (+91.6%) to Rs 1,140m in 2015. Marathons also recorded increased spending but the surprise package was kabbadi, where on-ground sponsorship grew fourfold, to Rs 480m, overtaking tennis.
The interest in other sports also meant that the endorsements industry grew significantly, by 27%, as brands signed up a range of athletes across different disciplines. In fact, endorsements from other sports rose by 90%, from Rs 221m to Rs 420m.
Further evidence of the growing importance of non-cricket sports came in the figures for team sponsorship, where these now account for 38.9% of spending, up from 29.5% in 2014. Overall spending here was up 13%, despite cricket team sponsorship seeing marginal 1.9% drop; team sponsorship in other sports jumped 48.8% to Rs 2,170m.
"This is what drove the market forward at a time when cricket was not pulling its weight sufficiently," the report said.
In Sporting Nation in the Making, produced by ESP Properties and SportzPower, the value of the sports sponsorship market – including ground sponsorship, team sponsorship and franchise fees, player endorsements and on air (but not such things as gate receipts, player fees, prize money, merchandising and subscriptions) – was put at Rs 51, 854m ($798m) in 2015, which represented 12.3% growth on the previous year.
On air accounted for just over half the total (52%), with team sponsorship and franchise fees taking a further 20.2%, ground sponsorship 19.9% and player endorsements 8.0%.
The fastest-growing area was on-ground sponsorship, which increased 29.6%, from Rs 7,948m in 2014 to Rs 10,305m in 2015. Cricket continues to account for over half the spending here but its share has dropped seven percentage points to 51.4% as other sports have attracted Indian fans.
The most significant of these is football, where on-ground sponsorship almost doubled (+91.6%) to Rs 1,140m in 2015. Marathons also recorded increased spending but the surprise package was kabbadi, where on-ground sponsorship grew fourfold, to Rs 480m, overtaking tennis.
The interest in other sports also meant that the endorsements industry grew significantly, by 27%, as brands signed up a range of athletes across different disciplines. In fact, endorsements from other sports rose by 90%, from Rs 221m to Rs 420m.
Further evidence of the growing importance of non-cricket sports came in the figures for team sponsorship, where these now account for 38.9% of spending, up from 29.5% in 2014. Overall spending here was up 13%, despite cricket team sponsorship seeing marginal 1.9% drop; team sponsorship in other sports jumped 48.8% to Rs 2,170m.
"This is what drove the market forward at a time when cricket was not pulling its weight sufficiently," the report said.
Data sourced from ESP Properties, SportzPower, afaqs!; additional content by Warc staff
