To me, that shows their true colours. If they were really interested in sponsorship, and benefitting you, not just their pocketbook, they would have taken the deal. Hell, that sounds like a fantastic deal to me. 20% off for someone who just walked in off the street looking for sponsorship? I certainly wouldn’t expect that if I were hunting for a sponsor.
This is all very interesting and I’m glad Bing started this thread. Personally, if I were on the hunt for sponsors (and I may be in the near future) I wouldn’t expect anything from them on the first few purchases except maybe a free sticker to put on the car. But that’s just me, and I’ve seen the inside of running your own buisiness… And I’m not a bum just looking for free shit. With the right exposure and the right terms, I would hazzard to guess that sponsorship can be one of the cheapest forms of advertising besdies word of mouth.
Think about it this way (we’ll use someone worth sponsoring for this example), you sponsor someone, and it costs you… $300 out of pocket. Now, $300 isn’t even going to get you a black and white text ad in a magazine, however, you toss that $300 in parts, or dyno time, or paint, or powdercoating, welding, or whatever into a car, and put a sticker on it. Not only do you have the exposure that sticker provides, but you have all the word of mouth pimpage that that person provides, AND you have the benefit of your exposure being directed specifically and exclusively at the market you’re targeting.
Please, one of you guys feel free to correct me if I’m wrong with that statement, but I would like to think it’s fairly close to accurate. And again, it goes back to the right terms of sponsorship (whether it’s a discount, a deal, free stuff, buddy pricing on labour, or even just some extra hands when work is being done on the car)… Whatever it is that your company can ‘afford’ or deems worth doing for said car.
I think I’m starting to ramble now, so I’ll end it there, but hopefully that’s a reasonably useful contribution.
-Pete