3D offensive in the advertising from the football stadiums

The industry of the sport marketing from Romania made one more step towards professionalizing by introducing new instruments generators of image.

In the season recently ended, the football clubs and the advertising agencies have adopted on large scale, a “third generation” instrument for the advertising on stadiums -3D advertisement. After the billboards type banner and the LED Display, the clubs have tried to turn account from the point of view of the image, the space near the goals, outside the field, without putting in danger the players’ safety.

The 3D banners are known in industry as 3D carpets, 3D Signs or CamCarpets. These are gripped horizontally, but offer to the TV cameras a similar image with the ones fixed vertically, thanks to their tridimensional characteristics. “The clubs appreciate the idea that we have brought them an instrument through which they can dress their incomes”, Gabriel Gurita, general director of the company Campion Sport, which owns exclusive authorization in Romania for this type of products, says. Campion Sport is the official partner of the Danish company LogoPaint, the only relevant producer on this segment at world level.

Thanks to the privileged position of representative of LogoPaint, Campion Sport became a relevant player also on the market of commercializing the commercial rights. In some cases, Campion Sport carries out only of the fabrication of the carpet, and in another cases also of selling the respective advertising space. In the season 2007 - 2008 of the First League, the clubs Steaua, Dinamo, Rapid, Poli Timisoara, Universitatea Craiova and Poli Iasi have used 3D carpets in the matches from their own field. “The rest of the clubs don’t have media potential. The product isn’t very cheap such as any club to afford it”, Gurita says.

The main sponsors on this segment were Holsten, Coca-Cola, Ceresit, Orange, Locic, Atac, Media- Gala- xy and Powerade. “The big companies don’t afford to risk, to put another product there, because it’s of no use , it’s a product experienced for many years, it’s difficult to invent something else, it’s a special technology”, Gurita says. In the last season, some clubs have tried to cover the respective space with a “sheet” imprinted with a logo, but they gave up because of the bad image on the TV transmission.

The most of the clubs which have resorted to 3D method have included the afferent advertising space in a general package offered to the sponsors. In most of the cases, this space is offered to one of the main sponsors, beneficiaries of the “platinum”, “gold” or “silver” packages

“The goal is the culmination of the football game and the goals and the adjacent advertisings are present in all the important stages of a live transmission, but also in the briefs presented in the sport news journals and in football analysis TV shows”, Gurita says. This is the reason for which the main sponsors want to have included in their own package the 3D carpets. In case in which they would have sold all separated, the average value of this space during a championship it raises to 30.000 euro. In what concerns “the perimeter advertising” - the vertical panels, most of the clubs gave up the sale or intermediary rights towards the company ISM.

Advertising on stadiums is one of the marketing instruments that is placed at the disposal of a football club. Now, the clubs offer a “promotion mix”. The companies’ image is promoted on the players equipments, in the perimeter advertisement or 3D, on the panels from the conference press rooms or in the “flash-interview” area, on the printed materials by the club, by PR actions of the club or by selling the t-shirts or other clothing objects. The highest incomes from marketing are obtained by the clubs Steaua, Dinamo and Rapid. In relative terms, the cashing from commercial rights raise to about 30% of the total incomes of the club.

Gabriel Gurita opened the company in 2004, after a period of four years in which he represented on the Romanian market the German producer of sport equipment Reusch. Campion Sport operates as an agency which offers marketing services and management for the sport industry, having as goal the maximization of the financial profit and image of the clients - clubs, federations or companies which invest in sport.