Sponsorship Change and the Ghost of Sponsorship Past

One of the primary funding sources for various festival and event types is corporate sponsorship. These partnerships allow festivals to operate at a sufficient level while providing their corporate sponsors a variety of benefits. One of the key benefits (especially for larger sponsorships) is having the two brands (the corporate and the event's) become synonymous with each other in the mind of the consumer. The customer perceives a corporate entity supporting an event as sharing a common interest and thus the sponsorship can be used by sponsors as a tool to increase awareness and enhance image. What happens though when an event replaces a major sponsor with another? This case study examines participants' sponsor recall following such a change. Using 5 years of data, this case illustrates that changes in major sponsorship need to be strategically conducted in order to ensure that the incoming partner is not haunted by the ghost of the sponsor they have replaced.