Sports Business and Marketing Conference North 2011 - 14 November

On Monday 14 November, How-Do will be holding its fourth annual North West Football Awards (NWFA). This year we are also introducing an added element to the day with a half day conference in the afternoon bringing together several acclaimed figures from across the UK’s sporting, retail and sports business world, to share their expertise and thoughts on the business and marketing of sport and in related areas.

How-Do has established a particular niche in the business of sport with its creation and development of the NWFA (last year’s dinner attracted almost 500 guests) and this year’s inaugural Northern Sports Awards.

Over a sit down lunch and across the afternoon of Monday 14 November, several leading industry figures from sport, retail, leisure and business consultancy, have agreed to speak at the inaugural Sports Business and Marketing Conference North 2012. The speakers include: Andy Anson/Kitbag, Ben Elkington/MUFC merchandising, Ben Hatton/Rippleffect, Ben Wells, former head of marketing Chelsea FC, Paul Rawnsley/Deloitte, Richard Ayers/MCFC, Robert Elstone/Everton FC and Sally Bolton/Rugby Football League.

To book a ticket/s, please click here.

Topics to be addressed at the eight conference workshops and panel sessions include:

•    converting sports clubs' support into revenue
•    digital marketing
•    engaging with your fan and customer base online
•    maximising branding opportunities/potential
•    sport and merchandising
•    UEFA Financial Fair Play - game changer?
•    sporting strategic focus
•    hosting and planning for the Rugby League World Cup 2013 - the process and delivery thereof

This inaugural conference is supported by two of the region’s leading marketing services companies working within the broader sports industry: digital agency Rippleffect and creative agency Origin.

The speakers at the conference are:

Andy Anson, chief executive, Kitbag
Ben Elkington, commercial manager, Manchester United merchandising
Ben Hatton, managing director, Rippleffect
Ben Wells, former head of marketing, Chelsea
Paul Rawnsley, director, Sports Business Group, Deloitte
Richard Ayers, head of digital, MCFC
Robert Elstone, chief executive, Everton FC
Sally Bolton, planning and project director, Rugby Football League

Our guest speaker over lunch is Andy Anson, recently installed as the new chief executive of Oldham-based sports retailer Kitbag. However, most How-Do readers are likely to be more familiar with Andy in his previous guise as the chief executive officer who led England’s 2018 World Cup bid.

Andy is not a presenter at the afternoon work shop sessions but has agreed to take questions over lunch.

Who should attend?

It is rare to have such a senior group of sports business and commercial operators speaking at such a conference in the North and we are anticipating significant demand for the limited number of tickets we have available.

We envisage delegates coming from the following sectors:

Sports clubs, professional and financial services, retailers and companies enaging in sports-related activities, marketing services agencies, media and media production services companies, the leisure and tourism industry and public bodies interested in enhancing their commercial sporting knowledge.

Ticket and event information

Date: Mon 14 November 2011. Lunch 12 for 12.30 and workshops 2 to 4.30
Venue: Lancashire County Cricket Club, Talbot Road, Manchester M16 0PX
Early bird tickets booked by Friday 23 September cost just £95 plus vat and thereafter will rise to £140 plus vat.

To book a ticket/s, please click here.

Speaker information

Andy Anson, chief executive, Kitbag

Football kit retailer Kitbag, owned by listed home shopping group Findel, appointed Oldham born Andy Anson as managing director in June this year.

Anson, who led England's unsuccessful 2018 World Cup bid, has spent many years in senior roles in the sports business.
Among the variety of challenges he’s undertaken, he has worked as cchief executive of the ATP Europe tennis body, Manchester United where he was commercial director, Channel 4 and a stint for the Disney Corporation in the US.

In the year to April 1 2011, Kitbag made an operating profit of £1.8m from sales of £58m.

Kitbag sells kits via the internet and also runs online and club shops for the likes of Barcelona, Real Madrid, Manchester City and Manchester United. In July Kitbag announced a 10 year multi-million pound retail deal with Leicester Tigers.

Ben Elkington, commercial manager, Manchester United merchandising

Ben joined MUFC in July last year in his current role.

He has held several roles across the sports and retail sectors.

Prior to MUFC, he was the senior licensing manager for the NBA and prior to that he was a brand manager at sports and footwear retailer Foot Locker.

Other roles have included head of retail at the privately-owned company Alshaya, a SBU Manager with New Era Cap Co and buying positions with both Rangers FC and Chelsea FC.

Ben Hatton, managing director, Rippleffect

Hatton and his 60 odd colleagues at Rippleffect have carved a clear niche for themselves as one of the UK’s leading digital agencies in the sports industry world. One their clients, Arsenal.com, won the ‘Best Sport Website’ at the Website of the Year Awards in 2010.

Other sports, retail and leisure clients include MCFC, Everton, Helly Hansen, Arena Leisure, Total Fitness and Love The Races.

Rippleffect is now owned by the publishing company Trinity Mirror.

Ben Wells, former head of marketing, Chelsea

Ben has fourteen years’ marketing experience in the commercial side of sport. Most recently he was the head of marketing at Chelsea Football Club where he was responsible for the club’s global marketing strategy, integration of sponsor partners and development of a company-wide approach to customer engagement.

Prior to nearly six years at Chelsea, Ben spent three years at Redmandarin, the highly-respected sponsor strategy consultancy, where he consulted to Philips Electronics, Carlsberg, Microsoft and Toshiba.


Paul Rawnsley, director, Sports Business Group, Deloitte

Paul has over 10 years’ experience advising clients on a wide range of financial, transaction, commercial and regulatory issues across various sports. 

Paul has supported UEFA to design and implement the financial criteria for the
European-wide club licensing system, and more recently assisted the development of UEFA's new 'financial fair play' requirements. 

Paul is also an author/editor of the highly acclaimed Deloitte Annual Review of
Football Finance.

Richard Ayers, head of digital, Manchester City FC

Manchester City is a football club on the up. The scale of its brand, business and media ambitions match the intentions on the pitch. Richard is focussed on driving forward the club's approach to media - championing innovation, forming unique partnerships and delivering increased audience engagement and reach.

A hybrid of content and commercial expertise, Richard was originally a radio journalist who turned geek when the Today programme's editor said 'we should get on the information superhighway' in '94. He was part of the team that launched BBC News online in '97 winning awards for his special report on Kosovo pioneering data journalism, and inventing the BBC's first news discussion board 'Talking Point'. In the .com boom he went commercial and ran Tiscali's portal for the next 7 years, melding creativity and monetisation, increasing user engagement and quadrupling revenues. In 2008, he became MD of gong-laden multiplatform production company Magic Lantern and, among other projects, launched the Guardian's video service.

For the last few of years he has focussed on a small portfolio of clients including the BFI, the Guardian, Hodder publishing and was Web Publishing Director for the regional division of Trinity Mirror.


Robert Elstone, chief executive, Everton FC

Robert was appointed as deputy CEO of Everton in 2005 and was appointed permanent CEO in 2009. He has a reputation as one of the UK’s leading experts in the business of sport.
His foray into the sporting world began as the executive assistant to the chief executive of the Rugby Football League and in 1997 moved to Deloitte for his first of two spells with the consultants. He made a name for himself as the industry's first ever sports business consultant, establishing a telling foothold in new territory and acting as a successful advisor to leagues, clubs and sports related organisations on a range of strategic and commercial activities.
In 2000 he moved to BSkyB as the director of Football Business Affairs and worked closely with a number of Premier League clubs following Sky's acquisition of equity in four leading clubs. Utilising the unique skill-set he enhanced and developed during his time with Deloitte, Robert secured a series of key commercial agreements.
He returned to Deloitte in 2004 as the director of the Sports Business Group that he had helped develop.


Sally Bolton, director of projects and planning, Rugby Football League

My first job in Rugby League was working for the RFL on the Centenary celebrations for the sport and the World Cup that was staged in 1995. This role was working as assistant in the marketing and commercial department with lots of very hands on involvement in the delivery of the tournament.
Since then I have worked at Leeds Rhinos in the commercial and marketing department, worked at Super League (Europe) Ltd as Events & Operations Manager, at Wigan RL as CEO.

I arrived back at the RFL in 2007 as Events Manager, which became Events & Projects Director and now Director of Projects & Planning.
My current role is as the lead on planning for the 2013 Rugby League World Cup.  In addition, I work closely with the CEO on strategic planning and reporting for the organisation as well as project managing a number of cross departmental projects.

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