Sponsorship for 2008-2009

[Rodney]

We are looking for more sponsors for the 2008-2009 season. As of right
now we only have two sponsors (Rochester Bike Shop and Velodrome at
Bloomer Park). Before we decided to pursue other sponsors I wanted to
ask the club for any ideas or suggestions on companies you would like
to sponsor us.

The companies I was planning on contacting for sponsorship requests
were the following,
American Cycle and Fitness ( With several locations in Southeast
Michigan, I believe they will be able to provide better services to
the many commuters we have in our club)
Rudy Project: Makers of Cycling sunglasses and cycling helmets.
Mavic: Company provides top of the line Wheel sets for Road Bikes and
Mountain bikes.

These are the companies I was planning on contacting for sponsorship
for the up coming season. This is not set in anyway, and I haven't yet
contacted anyone yet. So if you have and ideas or suggestions, please
contact myself or Ryan Arb as soon as possible.

Rodney Eaton

[Adam Wint]

Hey Rodney,

 

I worked for American Cycle and Fitness for awhile, they supposedly sponsor a team of their own so I am not sure how interested they will be (as an employee you'd never know however, they never seem to say anything about their team). 

 

Some other companies to consider, and I could see about getting some contact information for you, would be:

 

Tifosi (sunglasses manufacturer, smaller but they are in almost all the small bike shops around here)

 

Domino's Pizza (Being local to Michigan they have a good community outreach program)

Rochester Mills (They have a small bike club of their own but not competitive)

 

Chrysler (we are in their backyard afterall)

 

Lifetime Fitness

 

I think there is quite a wide group you could approach abotu sponsorship, the question is what are you asking from them?  If money, then how much?  Do you have a structured donor system to reward them for their contributions?  For instance, if they give you $500 what do they get... mention on the website, a patch on the jersey, etc.

 

I have to admit I am not sure how you guys want to do this but I'd recommend a three tier system, find 1 big "gold" sponsor, then 2 or 3 "silver" sponsors, and then 5 to as many as 15 "Bronze" sponsors, with each tier getting a predefined representation.  Otherwise I am not sure how you will sell a sponsor on the club. 

 

Also, and sorry - I have a full time job and all the meetings that have been held since early last fall have been either when I am at work or in class - but I am not sure if you are fielding a mountain biking team or not.  Unfortunately I don't have the time to spare to join the team but I'd like to train with you guys.  I mountain bike 3 or 4 times a week in the evenings and plan on dragging my road bike out one of these days for a ride. 

 

I'd like to see this work for you guys though, if you get back to me with what structure you are working off of for the sponsorship and what you are offering sponsors I'd be happy to track down some contact information for you for potential sponsors to contact at your leisure - including American Cycle and Fitness.

 

Just get back to me,

 

Adam

[Rodney]

Hey Adam,

I was planning on working off a system like you described. Having one
major sponsor, with two or three larger sponsors, and then several
smaller ones. Steven H brought up a great point of having a club
sponsorship needs list. I will start putting a needs list together
tonight so we can have a better idea of what items the club needs. You
also have a great point of "a structured donor system to reward them
for their contributions?" As a club, the things we can offer companies
are advertisement and our business.

For smaller companies like American Cycle and Fitness, we will be
offering then a name on our jersey/website and also our clubs
business. For a large company like Chrysler and Dominos Pizza we can
only offer them advertisement on our jersey's and website. We would
need to come up with more ideas to give back to the larger
corporations, because they would be supporting us more.

Also we plan to field a mountain bike team this season. We had a few
riders compete in last year's season, and we should be able to have
more riders compete this upcoming season. But you do plan on dragging
out the road bike let us know. Their are several of us who are roadies
and do a couple of group rides a week.

As far as contacts go, I have spoken to American Cycle and Fitness in
the past and already know who to contact, but for the other companies,
contact information would be great.

So far thanks to everyone with their ideas and support. I am already
getting a better idea of what needs to be done for next season.


Rodney