Racing and Sponsorship

Today we visited the V8 Motor Cars Eastern Creek International Raceway to learn about racing in Australia. The development of the raceway was approved by the NSW state government in 1989, and opened in 1990. This raceway hosts a range of events such as concerts, free ride days, Ferrari experiences, driver trainings, and a variety of motor/car racing festivals. Although racing is a relatively new sport in Australia, it is still important for the economy. Since the track offers multiple events, the sport attracts all ages and types of people. The opening of the raceway created many jobs for people, staffing over 500 people for each big event. Small businesses around the area, such as shops, hotels, pubs, and restaurants, benefit from the fans that attend the raceway. The races and events themselves bring in a big profit, selling up to 27,000 tickets at the bigger events. Overall, racing positively affects the Australian economy.

Corporations decide whether to sponsor an event or sport by creating a sponsorship policy and adhering to it. This policy specifies what a company will sponsor, what it won’t sponsor, which audiences should be targeted, quantity of sponsorships that should be undertaken over a given period, and the level of sponsorship de voted to each event. Corporations must also keep in mind that sponsorships can be used and interpreted by consumers as a symbolic expression of organizational identity. From the Australian sports we have experiences thus far; KFC, Jack Daniels, Nissan, Corona, Altima, Coca Cola, and Carleton Draught are all big corporate sponsors.

Today we also got to visit the Sydney Wildlife Park where we got to feed kangaroos and pet koalas…so cuteJ