New kid on the block

We speak to Manley Hopkinson about his new ocean racing marketing company, Boating Partners

Manley Hopkinson

A number of sports marketing companies specialising in yacht racing - particularly ocean racing - seem to be coming out of the woodwork at present. Whether this is pure coincidence or the fact that the sponsorship marketing in yacht racing, particularly in the wake of Ellen MacArthur and Offshore Challenges, is maturing slightly or simply that those involved with the sponsored areas of our sport are increasingly their professionality, is hard to judge.

One of the more impressive players to join this particular party is London-based company Boating Partners (UK). This is the brainchild of Manley Hopkinson, former Olympic Group skipper in the BT Global Challenge, now Managing Director of the fledgling company. The other key personnel involved are South African businessman and Boating Partners Chairman David Gant, Operations Director Kevin Bennetts and Marketing Director Tim Howland of S2 Marketing. Gant has a strong background in sports TV and golf - he led Wales' successful Ryder Cup bid for 2010 - and previously as CEO of World Sport Group secured the commercial and media rights for the ICC Cricket World Cups from 2003-2007.

Manley Hopkinson cuts an impressive and colourful character. He is a former inspector with the Hong Kong Marine Police and was with the navy during the Gulf War. Aside from this he is also an adventurer - last year his three man team won a race to the Magnetic North Pole involving pulling a 120lb sledge 400 miles. He is also a qualified marine engineer and has had his own boat building and servicing company.

Despite only being launched to the public recently Boating Partners have been spent the last two years looking at the sponsorship market in general and how yacht racing fits into it. Over the course of this time they have been developing the best possible case as to why potential sponsors - be they corporate or individuals - should back ocean racing projects and how they can get the best value out of this. Ultimately they are looking to have a range of properties in ocean racing and in their current portfolio are the Volvo Ocean Race, Antarctica Cup and the Mini Transat.

"With our Directors and associates we have had experience in various Whitbreads, the Volvo Ocean Race, the Global Challenge obviously, America’s Cup and Swedish Match Tour and we have looked at sponsorship relationships in all those events going back some 15-20 years - at which ones worked and which one’s didn’t commercially," Hopkinson says. "In the last Volvo for example, the best commercial campaigns didn’t win the race, but SEB and Assa Abloy for instance went away overjoyed with their involvement. And at the end of the day what has got to happen with sailing is that every sponsor has got to walk away thinking ‘yep, that was fantastic’ and they become an ambassador for the sport. For any one chap who is upset there will be 100 others who don’t come on board."

In the past there have also been a number of yacht racing sponsorships which haven't worked as well. "A lot isn’t the sailors, it is the organisation that is put together," he explains. "The first thing we are saying to companies is ‘what would your goals be?’ We are trying to introduce is the general concept of how it can be used. We are saying there are three values that you buy - they are exposure, contact and concept values - and that is what the sponsor is investing in."

Exposure, he says, is the easy one to think about. "It is about media, networking and getting out there and how it can be used in global and local aspects, and how you can use it to bring people together. An example of that is the arrangement I have following the North Pole trip is with Bang & Olefsen where I am doing a series of talks in their showrooms. Whereas previously they would say 'come and have a look at a new telly', now they are saying 'come and hear the amazing story of this race to the North Pole and whilst you’re here, look at our new telly'."

'Contact' is the opportunity for organisations to mix with other organisations, while 'concept' is for companies to benefit from the values offered by the spirit of the race they can get involved with.

Key Partners have identified four areas sponsors typically want to target through the sponsorship of ocean racing campaigns:

- the market (products and services)
- the capital market
- employees (internal – mergers and acquisitions)
- society (political bodies or institutions, new markets in different countries, etc)

Within each of these their three values (exposure, contact and concept) are applicable and, crucially, not just in marketing terms. "We are saying all these values you can use across the whole board. It is not just the marketing budget or your PR budget or your HR budget - it is trying to use it more cleverly."

Their reasons for tackling the Volvo Ocean Race, the Antarctica Cup and the Mini Transat is that they are different scale events, requiring different levels of budget.

"Each of those are at different levels and enable us to approach different-sized companies," says Hopkinson. "What we won’t do is support competing races - so we wouldn’t support a number of races where we have to speak to the same company for involvement. So the idea that the Antarctica race offers a different scale and a different set of values to the Volvo. The Antarctica Cup is in identical, nationally-driven boats, so you have the national interest - the UK boat will be UK crewed and will fly under a UK flag. So it is the World cup of ocean racing." He says the Antarctica Cup has also impressed him by having an owner's association that directs what other events the fleet will race in and for example will decide upon the new type of boat, when it is to be renewed in six years time. "So this all makes it different from the Volvo which is still the Formula 1 of ocean racing," he adds.

At present Hopkinson is looking to skipper both the Volvo Ocean Race and Antarctica Cup entries and he has strong reasons for doing so.

"The rationale for that is that one of the things which can happen in ocean racing is that the attitude sometimes to the commercial backer or the private individual or organisation can be poor amongst the sailors. That has to change. A sailor has to understand where they sit in the relationship: There can be no sailing without commercial partners and they must respect that.

"One of my strengths as Managing Director of Boating Partners, in terms of what we are trying to achieve commercially and also as a highly competitive sailor, is I think I can balance the two together. What we are strong about at Boating Partners is that we are focussing on the team. We believe strongly that the team ego is bigger than individual egos. So we are not about getting rock stars on board. I firmly believe the strength of the team is much stronger than the sum of the individuals and that is what we are working on. It is an attitude which I can help bring in to all our campaigns, by leading the first one. It also happens that I am a public speaker by profession as well and to be able to stand up and talk to the corporates and to the world is a good thing. So that is the image we are trying to get over - anyone who comes on board any Boating Partners campaign must have those abilities as well and understand the relation between the commerce and the sailing, the team and the individual egos and also the ability to present and be presentable."

Whether the team first, talent second approach will work in the Volvo Ocean Race remains to be seen. Certainly this is not the way teams have won that event in recent years and most believe that with crew numbers being reduced for this next race crew experience will count for even more. "I am not knocking them, they are very skilled sailors," he explains. "Some are out there with entirely the right attitude of wanting to muck in and scrub the bottom with the shore crew. That is the attitude I like. I am not saying there won’t be crews out of the ranks of those who have done it before because you need experience as well. But I also strongly believe there is a lot of talent out there which for one reason or the other are not in the picture now and it is very difficult to get in. So we are very open and it is more to do with attitude as well as skill level."

Aside from a Manley Hopkinson-led Volvo Ocean Race campaign, Boating Partners are also touting for the first properly funded and managed 'women-led' campaign and have recruited formed Royal & SunAlliance and Amer Sport Too crewwoman Emma Westmacott as skipper.

"Invariably the girls get the blokes’ training boat at the last minute with no budget and very little support and do remarkably well for it, but it doesn’t paint them in the picture they could be painted in," says Hopkinson. "Emma is very good for all the values I said earlier as well, about ego and being presentable and a very good sailor and understanding the commercial side of it all. We are very pleased to have her on board.
If she gets the money first, maybe I won’t go sailing at all!"

Significantly this campaign is being described as 'women led' rather than 'all women' as they are looking for the best team and if there is a particular skill set that can't be found among women sailors they will recruit men.

The advantage of having women's involvement in the team are also commercial ones "We are actively seeking, a different kind of company who would like to be involved with a women’s-led campaign," Hopkinson explains. "We are talking to people whose products and services have a femine slant to it."

In terms of budget, he feels that the $15 million figure Volvo Event Management are claiming campaign budgets will be is on the light side. "We’ll be talking more than that. We don’t feel that is enough for a winning campaign. What we are trying to do is to make sure is we give ourselves the best chance of winning on the water but also make sure that we win commercially." Their expected budget is £15 million over three years.

In comparison the budget for the Antarctica Cup is one third of what they are looking for for the Volvo - £5 million over two years with a £1 million per annum extension. "That works differently," he says of the non-stop race around the bottom of the planet. "You get the boat 45 days before the race start, all fully kitted out. So there are no design fees or time scales to look at."

However the main issue with the Volvo Ocean Race is exactly timing and deadlines. "It is getting tighter and tighter," Hopkinson agrees. "The ideal scenario is that we get our new boat with a year to go which would mean come Easter or June certainly that the build has got to start. You can go beyond that, but a lot depends upon what other people are doing and seeing who makes the first leap."

In terms of the Mini Transat, Boating Partners are backing 24 year old Clemency Williams, who has just purchased the Simon Rogers-designed sistership to Jonathan McKee's boat. (Return tomorrow to read our interview with Ms Williams). For this they are looking for £200,000 over two years.

Aside from their prospective range of ocean racing properties and their analysis of ways sponsors can get the most value out of the sport, Boating Partners also have a number of other cunning schemes.

Along the lines of what Challenge Business have done, Boating Partners have their own 'race club' where smaller organisations can get involved at a more modest level in the campaigns they are running. Most impressive though is the tax loophole they have found for investors to get involved.

"We have created a phenomenal link with the British film industry - it is absolutely brilliant - setting up Limited Liability Partnerships to invest in British films which due to the tax law, enables you to recupe tax paid and any losses you make for three years previous. That has been funding the British film industry for the last few years. We have created a link with that and that can help fund people into our race club, so you will invest in a film and the Boating Partners race club and it won’t cost you a cent - it all comes from the tax man."

Boating Partners have been working on this scheme with tax specialists Kirkham Motte Lrd and Defender Productions, a film production and investment company that specialise in such schemes (for the breakdown of how this works - click here).

As part of their promotion Boating Partners are also holding a number of 'awareness events' where they invite a mixture of media, support partners, their syndicates and the race club. To date these have been held in Portsmouth Naval Dockyards and on Monday at London Boat Show. "The idea is that we will roll them out every couple of months in different places around the world, to present ourselves and why we think we are different and where we think the values and strengths are in a campaign."

Another aspect to Boating Partners are their strong links with South Africa. The company in fact was originally established in South Africa as a means of selling the boating industry there overseas and if any of their ocean racing project allow it, their race boats will be built in South Africa, possibly at their own build facility.

"The general plan is to support the SA industry as well," says Holkinson. "We are also looking at a South African boat with the Antarctica Cup. Originally with the Volvo we were looking at a whole South African Volvo campaign, but with the exchange rate with the Rand it might be tricky. The government are very helpful down there. You can sit down with the Trade and Industry and the Finance Minister around a table with a cup of coffee and they say 'how can we help?' rather than putting in thousands of regulations about small businesses... It is a great training ground too - come out of Cape Town and you are straight into the open ocean."

In terms of other projects Hopkinson says that they have a good range at present and will stick there for the time being, although he is always open to suggestions. "If we feel there is something that can offer particular values or if someone comes up with a plan, then we’ll look at it closely and ask does that fit in with what we are trying to achieve. And can we support it? We don’t want to spread ourselves too thin." Since carrying out our interview Boating Partners are now also supporting World Champion power boat record holder, Neil McGrigor's round Britian circumnavigation attempt in less than 24 hours.