Castrol UEFA EURO 2008™ was crowned winner of the prestigious International Sponsorship Award at the recent ESA European Sponsorship Awards ceremony in Brussels.
Castrol beat off competition from Team Visa Beijing, The Artemis Transat and iShares Cup Extreme 40 Sailing Series to win the title.
Commenting on its success, Toby Hester Head of Brand Football at Castrol, said: “We are delighted to win, particularly given the quality of campaigns we were competing against. Castrol came into UEFA EURO 2008™ as a new sponsor, where relationships between fans and media for existing sponsors had been long established. We used an innovative approach to the sponsorship based around the Castrol Performance Index and worked hard to integrate this across our business, which has a significant B2B focus. Sponsorships on this scale are typically B2C focused, so to win the independent endorsement from ESA is a reward for our approach and something in which we can be very proud.”
Despite losing out to Castrol in the International category, iShares won the Business to Business Award. Other category winners were Turkcell – Snowdrops (Business to Community); Etihad Airways & The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Senior Championship (Business to Consumer) and G4S 4teen (Business to Employee).
Entries were received from 12 European countries and from all sectors of the industry. Karen Earl, Chairman of the European Sponsorship Association commented: “The spread of entries across such a range of sectors and countries is testament to the importance of sponsorship as a marketing tool across Europe. The Awards provide an opportunity to celebrate and reward industry excellence.”
Such was the depth and quality of entries, that in addition to the winners, the judges were compelled to highly commend HBOS Bank of Scotland totalART (Business Consumer) and Accenture’s silver sponsorship of Skandia Team GBR (Business to Business). In the Business to Community category, KD Life Insurance: A child's smile is the meaning of life! received a Special Acknowledgment for the amount it achieved on a limited budget.
