2003 Taverner Cup - Sponsorship For Business

TEAM SPONSORSHIP

For you to sponsor a team, you must pay a mandatory corporate sponsor fee to the Ottawa Field-Naturalists, the parent of the organizer (the Fletcher Wildlife Garden) for the privilege of being part of the event. Corporate sponsors will also assume the participants' fee for the team which takes your name for promotional purposes. Some teams may already be sponsored by a natural history club, bird club, or not-for-profit group. In this case you become a co-sponsor but still receive full promotional benefit.
Sponsor Fee:

For corporate sponsors in the Ottawa-Carleton region, the $300.00 sponsor fee would go to the Ottawa Field-Naturalists' Fletcher Wildlife Garden, a 16 acre demonstration garden with interpretive centre which is being developed to promote wildlife gardening and local/regional natural history.

For out-of-town corporate sponsors, where your fee would go would depend on whether you were a sponsor or co-sponsor. If you are the only sponsor, the fee would go to the Fletcher Wildlife Garden. If you are a co-sponsor, 75% of the fee would go to an environmental project agreed to between the team and the co-sponsors, with the remaining 25% going to the Fletcher Wildlife Garden.
Participant Fee:

Corporations also pay the participants' fees. The participant fee will be used to pay for refreshments on the evening of the event, for the brunch the next day, for promotion, and for the basic administration costs which includes telephone, printing and postage etc.

The individual team member entry fee is $30 (rules call for a minimum team size of 3 and maximum of 6). Thus if you supported a team of 4 people, you would pay an entry fee of $120.00, in addition to the sponsor fee of $300.00, for a total monetary commitment of $420.00.

We point out that while we anticipate that most sponsors will be organizations and businesses directly related to birding, a non-birder business like a car dealership, a gas company, a chemical company, a courier company or a sporting goods store, can still sponsor a Taverner Cup team. All it requires is for the team to be co-sponsored by an organization directly involved with birds, natural history or the environment. Example of co-sponsors include bird and naturalist clubs, foundations, friends organizations, government agencies, and institutions. You will find that most teams that approach you will be officially sponsored by one of these organizations.
WHY SPONSOR A TEAM?
There may be numerous reasons to sponsor a team

Favourable publicity;
Increased sales of goods and services among birders;
Competition with companies who also sponsor teams;
Personal association;
An interest in supporting environmental causes.

At the very least you will want recognition and publicity from your sponsorship. We would do this with the Cup-wide promotion as well as promotion which could be done by the members of the team you sponsor.

This is what we can offer:

Sponsor name on the official Taverner Cup sponsor T-shirt;
Sponsor name included in the Taverner Cup's list of corporate sponsors;
The opportunity to appear in major media. We anticipate that we can publicize our event with local/regional media such as CBC Radio and TV, hopefully some local commercial radio and TV channels, and possibly that the event would be picked up by national networks;
A free brunch. All corporate sponsors are invited to send two representatives to the Taverner Brunch on Sunday.
An 8" circular window decal with Taverner Logo which indicates that you are a Taverner Cup Sponsor

We encourage teams to do more for their sponsors. We have made the following suggestions to teams:

Prearrange with the press to cover the team on the event. This can mean having a writer or TV or radio crew go with the team on the "Big Day" or if this becomes difficult, they can go with the team on a scouting mission;
Get the local major newspaper (the paper widely circulated in the community where the sponsor is located) and a local radio station to cover them;
Take some photos for promotional purposes.

The Taverner Cup is an event that media people may well find unique!

You may want to feature your team in any in-house magazine, newsletter, or stockholders' magazine. We point out that with hundreds of thousands of Canadians interested in birdwatching, and many more feeding them, larger businesses may well find a favourable regard within the ranks of stockholders. If you have public relations people, get them involved in the promotion as well.
WHAT SORT OF BUSINESSES MIGHT BECOME A TEAM SPONSOR?

A corporation doesn't have to have a special stake in the birding community to be a sponsor. Nature does sell and concern for the environment is now a topic well entrenched in the mind set of most people. While recycling and solid waste management have limited appeal, we think that associating with an event that we intend to be fun, exciting, and newsworthy could be a winner!

You may be very interested in getting associated with projects that do good. A Taverner Cup, that raises thousands of dollars for and focuses public attention on the environment is one of them.

Of course the team you sponsor will take the sponsor's name as their own. In the World Series of Birding, held each year in New Jersey, this has even extended to sponsors supplying T-shirts or jackets to team members, bumper stickers etc. with the sponsor's name. This is something for you to work out with the team you sponsor.

EVENT SPONSORSHIP

If you don't feel comfortable with getting involved as a team sponsor at this time, you can still contribute by becoming a Taverner Cup Event Sponsor. Event sponsors can contribute in a number of ways such as:

making a cash or in-kind donation for refreshments on the evening of the event, or towards the brunch the next day;
donating prizes and/or gift certificates for items directly related to birding (binoculars, tripod and telescope, bird reference or identification guides, bird tapes, bird art, guided bird trips, bird feeders, bird seed etc.) or associated equipment (birder's clothing, backpacks, telescope carrying cases, etc.); these could to be awarded either to category winners or as part of a participants' draw as deemed by the sponsor;
you could also become an event sponsor by contributing free publicity for the event in birder's magazines, local newspapers and even through the tourist infrastructure since we want to put eastern Ontario and western Quebec on the map as an important destination for birding and eco-tourism.

Event sponsors of course will be identified with the objects they donate and be listed as official event sponsors in all our literature.

For more information on Team or Event Sponsorship please contact:

Jeff Harrison
Taverner Cup Coordinator
150 Wolseley N., Montreal West, P.Q. H4X 1V9
Tel: (514) 486-4943; Fax: (514) 487-8580;
Email: dha@videotron.ca