Craigslist Connects With Bay to Breakers

Bay to Breakers runners will have a new place to turn for their post race missed connections. The 102-year-old San Francisco race has named San Francisco-based Craigslist as presenting sponsor, following a scramble to replace the race's previous title sponsor, Zazzle. More than 30,000 athletes are expected to run among young professionals (Linkedin is now an official sponsor) and the most...

Paris Marathon Looks To Create Clean Energy From Runner Footsteps

Having recently signed on as the first-ever title sponsor of the Paris Marathon, Schneider Electric will be installing energy harvesting Pavegen tiles all along the 26.2 mile route and spectator paths at this weekend's race. With over 50,000 runners, the company says that the sponsorship activation will be the largest ever installation of the Pavegen technology. “Imagine if your run or walk...

How 'Bubba's Hover' Came About...

Last week, we took a look at Bubba Watson's new "Bubba Hover" viral video. On Friday, the Masters champion added some detail on CNBC. He says before you customize it, the standard Bubba hovercraft will set you back $16,000 and several golf courses have already placed pre-orders! In other news, Bubba says he's on the prowl for an automobile partner. #dealstag

Check Out The Adidas Haircut That Was Not OK With The NBA

The Knicks' Iman Shumpert showed unprecedented support for his endorsement deal with Adidas, showing up with this to last Friday's game with Milwaukee. Alas, after the NBA caught wind of the haircut, it was reduced to a sad empty triangle before Sunday's nationally televised match-up with OKC. Shumpert also apologized on Twitter with this before and after shot. Adidas has been the league's offi...

Whoops! Major Brands Sponsor Guantanamo-Themed Coachella Party (NSFW)

Somehow invitations made it out recently for this Smashbox Studios and True Religion-sponsored Coachella after party. Both sponsors have since backed out of the event, stating that they didn't know about the party's controversial theme, which has since been changed by the organizer, Flaunt Magazine, after considerable negative feedback. Refinery 29 has the story.

SeaWorld's Approach To Sponsorships Reflected In S-1

Last night, SeaWorld Entertainment finalized plans for its anticipated $540 million IPO coming later this week. Below is the most relevant bit on corporate sponsorships from the company's S-1 filed back in December. In particular, it's interesting to note the emphasis with which the company places on not only maximizing short-term revenue from sponsors, but also finding partners that can use th...

The Masters: A Business Unlike Any Other

Guan Tianlang has been the talk of the 2013 Masters Golf Tournament. The 14 year-old from China shot a 1-over-par 73 in his first round playing the Augusta National Golf Club. For many people, the fact that an eighth grader can shoot under 80 at this difficult course is unbelievable. What may be more surprising, however, is how Tianlang qualified for the Masters. The tournament allows only 9...

Watch Adam Scott Sponsor Searches Spike During The Masters

As he made his historic run through The Masters, Adam Scott not surprisingly stirred up a lot of traffic for not only himself, but his sponsors too. The graph below shows how Google searches coming to SponsorPitch spiked using the keyword "Adam Scott sponsors" as the weekend progressed going from virtually nil when the tournament started and steadily increasing throughout the weekend to more th...

Sponsors Respond To Boston Marathon Tragedy

By now, you've undoubtedly heard the incredibly tragic news from today's Boston Marathon. Throughout the day, Marathon sponsors have been speaking up through social media. Clearly sponsorship is not the story here, but here's a rundown of what some of their responses and crisis management efforts looked like in the aftermath of today's tragedy.

IPG CEO On IMG Sale: 'We're Well Rep'd By Octagon'

While CAA, Wasserman, Lagardère and other upstarts have created a more fragmented sports agency landscape in recent years, two of the oldest rivals are Octagon and IMG. Now that the latter is officially on the block, could they join forces? Here's what the CEO of Octagon's parent company, IPG, had to say about that possibility last Friday in a Q&A with analysts... Q (Daniel Salmon, BMO):You...