Unofficial Partner Podcast

This is the first of a series in collaboration with Turnstile, looking at alternative ways of valuing sports sponsorship and other commercial inventory. The conversation took place at the Emirates Stadium, home of Arsenal Football Club and our guests are Juliet Slot, Arsenal’s Chief Commercial Officer and Dan Gaunt, general manager of Turnstile. We talk about what a football club is selling, the hidden value of Intellectual Property, the role of the No More Red anti knife crime campaign and the burgeoning sponsor interest in women’s football. If you like the podcast, you’ll love the Unofficial Partner newsletter that goes to thousands of subscribers every Thursday, sign up via UnofficialPartner.comUnofficial 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

What is the state of Rugby League today? Who has the commercial and political power in the game and what impact will this year’s Rugby League World Cup have in the game’s major heartlands of the UK and Australia.These are just a few of the questions I put to today’s guest, Jamie Peacock MBE, who brings a lifetime of insight and expertise to the conversation, courtesy of being the most successful Rugby League player in Super League history, winning nine championships and four Challenge Cup winners medals for Bradford Bulls and Leeds Rhinos, during a career that saw him captain both England and Great Britain national teams.Since retiring from the game, Peacock has built a consultancy business focused on leadership mentoring and wellbeing, a subject very close to his heart, as Jamie will be running a 100 mile ultra marathon for Greenhouse Sports on Saturday 16th April. For more information please visit - https://www.justgiving.com/campaign/runfortheroofToday’s episode is sponsored by our friends at Turnstile, who are asking a good question: do you know what your sponsorship is really worth, or are you guessing?Turnstile uses real market rates to quantify the value every single sponsorship right within a deal, looking beyond the traditional media metrics to calculate the value of the Exposure, Intellectual Property and Direct Benefits.This enables Turnstile to deliver a recommended transaction price that’s comprehensive, accurate and defensible.So don’t pay too much. Don’t leave money on the table. Know the fair market price, and buy and sell with confidence. If you value your sponsorships, value them properly.Get in touch with Turnstile at turnstilegroup.com  We recorded this episode of the podcast at the London headquarters of Two Circles, and we thank them for their support. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

The subject today is club ownership in English football and the ongoing debate about the need for an independent regulator following the UK government review in to the governance of the game led by Tracey Crouch MP.Our guests are Nick Harris, John Scales and Niall Couper.Nick Harris is chief sports news correspondent for the Mail on Sunday newspaper and has recently published an extensive report asking fans what they thought of their club’s owners. The results are fascinating and are available to view on Nick’s Twitter page @sportingintel. John Scales played in the Premier League for Wimbledon, Spurs and Liverpool in a career which included winning three caps for England. He is now an entrepreneur working across sport. Niall Couper is head of media for Amnesty International UK and is chief executive of Fair Game, a pressure group consisting of English football clubs seeking to change the governance of the game.   There are close to 250 episodes of the podcast available by searching Unofficial Partner in your favourite podcast app or going via Apple or Spotify. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter or Linkedin and sign up to the weekly newsletter that goes to thousands of people across sport every Thursday.Today’s episode is sponsored by our friends at Turnstile, who are asking a good question: do you know what your sponsorship is really worth, or are you guessing?Turnstile uses real market rates to quantify the value every single sponsorship right within a deal, looking beyond the traditional media metrics to calculate the value of the Exposure, Intellectual Property and Direct Benefits.This enables Turnstile to deliver a recommended transaction price that’s comprehensive, accurate and defensible.So don’t pay too much and don’t leave money on the table, know the fair market price, and buy and sell with confidence. Get in touch with Turnstile at here.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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

Today’s conversation is about Olympic sports federations and the challenge of building and sustaining audiences for their sports on social media platforms. Our guests are Jonny Murch and Stéphane Schwander.Jonny is Chief executive of Red Torch, the award-winning research, digital and social media agency.Stéphane is head of digital at the FEI, the world governing body for equestrian sport and a member of the Olympic movement for over a century.Since 2017, Red Torch has tracked the performance of every Olympic federation on social media and the latest edition of the #SportonSocial League Table was published this week, and you can download it for free, via the shownotes of this podcast or go direct to the Red Torch website. There are close to 250 episodes of the podcast available by searching Unofficial Partner in your favourite podcast app or going via Apple or Spotify. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter or Linkedin and sign up to the weekly newsletter that goes to thousands of people across sport every Thursday. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

Our deep dive in to the sports media market with regular co-host Yannick Ramcke and guests Murray Barnett and Charlie Boss.Murray is founder of 26West Sport and formerly had senior roles at World Rugby, F1 and ESPN.Charlie is chief commercial director of The Jockey Club and was formerly at the Walt Disney Company.We talk about Buzzer, IPL, Discovery and HBO, Genius Sports and Pixellot; CVC and Ligue 1; sporting monocultures; Barstool and betting; Amazon, Looper, Facebook and the IPL auction.You can hear previous episodes of The Bundle series by searching Unofficial Partner in your favourite podcast app or going via Apple or Spotify. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter or Linkedin and sign up to the weekly newsletter that goes to thousands of people across sport every Thursday. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

This is episode 12 of ReThinking Sport, our series created in collaboration with Portas, the global strategy consultancy dedicated to sport and physical activity.  Today we’re asking what does 777 Partners, a Miami based private investment firm, see in professional British basketball? The company has recently bought 45% of the British Basketball League for $7million, having already bought up the London Lions franchise. This is part of a bigger move in to sports investment.  777 recently paid US$137 million for a 70 per cent in Vasco da Gama, which values the Brazilian club at US$333m, following on from other investments in La Liga club Sevilla and Serie A side, Genoa. So we talk the person Lenz Balan, who is Vice President at 777 and one of the people leading their move in to sport.Joining Lenz is Peter Hawkings, who is sports investment lead at Portas Consulting.You can hear the other episodes in the Portas series by searching Unofficial Partner in your favourite podcast app or going via Apple or Spotify. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter and sign up to the weekly newsletter that goes to thousands of people across sport Thursday. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

The most eye catching deal of this week was the announcement that Spotify, the music streaming company is buying almost the entire sponsorship inventory of FC Barcelona, including the shirt of the men’s and women’s teams, the training kit and a title partnership of the famous Camp Nou stadium. To get to what’s really happening here, we’ve brought together Tom Gray, Joel Seymour Hyde and Matt Rogan.Tom Gray is a founding member of Mercury Prize winning band Gomez and a board director of PRS For Music. Tom leads a social media-driven campaign, #BrokenRecord which calls for more of the streaming revenue ‘pie’ to make its way to artists and songwriters. His submission to the parliamentary select committee is referenced in the conversation and is available to read here. Joel Seymour Hyde is Managing Director for Octagon UK, the sport and entertainment agency with offices in 22 countries around the world including FRUKT which has particular expertise across music, entertainment and esports.Matt Rogan was a co-founder and former CEO of the Two Circles agency, and is now Non Executive Director and Senior Advisor in Sport. New book, 'All to Play For' was published in July 2021. As you’ll hear us reference, we recorded Matt’s contribution from a car park outside Wembley Stadium, so there’s a bit of road noise in the background. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter and sign up to the UP Newsletter that goes to thousands of sports business people every Thursday. Sign up via unofficialpartner.com As usual, every episode of Unofficial Partner can be found by using the big podcast providers, including Apple, Spotify, Google Podcasts or via your favourite podcast app. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

The price of television advertising is spiking rapidly and has big implications for the value of sport and the market for sponsorship, whether you're buying or selling.   More broadly, the events of the past two years have led to significant disruption to the advertising landscape. People's media habits changed considerably as their physical location was altered and advertisers were driven to adopt new investment strategies as audiences changed and physical channels were limited. Consumers sought more online distribution and product access through e-commerce and the overarching theme through this period has been acceleration:  Netflix took five years to reach 10 million households and Disney+ will get there in three. E-commerce saw five years worth of organic growth in just 12 months.To help us navigate through this complicated picture are today’s guests Alex Charkham and Bhavin Balvantrai. Alex is Chief Strategy Officer at Fuse, Omnicom’s sport and entertainment agency. Bhav is Chief Market Analyst at Omnicom Media Group and board director of BARB, the Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board.If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter and sign up to the popular industry newsletter that goes to thousands of subscribers every Thursday. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

This is an episode in our Re-Thinking Sport series in collaboration with Portas, the global strategy consultancy dedicated to sport and physical activity. Today, we're talking about the business of rugby union with our guest, Nick Garcia, the former City Football Group executive who is now CEO of Welsh club, Ospreys and Head of Team Sports at Y 11 sport and media, the Hong Kong based group that bought a 75.1% stake in the club in May, 2020. The other voice you'll hear is that Nick Rawlinson, senior consultant at Portas. If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter and join thousands of busy sports people who receive the Unofficial Partner newsletter every Thursday. Sign up via UnofficialPartner.comUnofficial 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.

The obvious context to today’s conversation are the terrible events happening in Ukraine, which has brought in to sharp focus sport’s role in the political landscape that surround them, in particular the role of governing bodies and the supply chain of professional enablers that are part and parcel of sportswashing and the soft power strategies beloved by autocratic regimes. My guests are two experts in the relationship between business and geopolitics.Robert Barrington served as Executive Director of Transparency International UK and is now Professor of Anti-Corruption Practice at the University of Sussex. Professor Dan Hough heads the department of politics at the same university and together they’ve written a book that couldn’t be more timely. It’s called Understanding Corruption: how corruption works in practiceUnofficial Partner listeners can get a 30% discount by clicking the above linkand using the code EMAIL30If you're interested in sports business analysis and comment, follow @UnffclPrtnr on Twitter and join thousands of busy sports execs who receive the UP Newsletter every Thursday.  Sign up via unofficialpartner.com As usual, every episode of Unofficial Partner can be found by using the big podcast providers, including Apple, Spotify, Google Podcasts or via your favourite podcast app. 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. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 400 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify, Google, Stitcher and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series, you can reach us via the website.