In November 2003 Communicate Sport hosted 'La Financiación del Fútbol', at the Spanish FA Headquarters in Las Rozas, Madrid. It was a football finance conference which saw over half the professional Spanish football clubs in attendance.

 

The project was conceived and developed on the back of a brief that was given to us by the Marsh Sports Practice who were keen to support their Spanish office in establishing greater links with the professional football clubs in Spain. They thought hosting an event would be a good way to go about the process of explaining the benefits of an effective risk management programme.

 

We took the project on, soon realising that what would be required would be a far bigger event that looked the financial side of football from different angles - providing a greater reason for clubs to travel to Madrid for the seminar. Having established this, we then looked for partners that could assist in this project, and provide either content or support that would allow the event to flourish and be successful.

 

We secured endoresement from La Liga de Fútbol Profesional, who agreed that the free seminar would be beneficial, and that they would both recommend, and invite the clubs to attend. We found additional content support from Ashurst Morris Crisp - leading securitisation lawyers with a Spanish office that had good links with the clubs, and MBNA in Spain, who were able to support the event with information regarding the financing of affinity marketing deals. We approached the Spanish Football Association, who agreed to provide their new state-of-the-art facilities, and then tied up a media partnership with leading business publication Marca - who provided pre- & post event coverage.

 

With these relationships in place, we were able to form a working group - who met regularly, and conversed weekly ensuring the event was a success - both in terms of the numbers of attendees, but also in delivering genuinely beneficial content to Spanish football clubs.

 

The Spanish office of the Marsh Sports Practice has since gone on to do business with a number of these clubs.