Last month, the Travelers Championship opened a new office in Stamford with the goal of increasing its sponsorship opportunities from major corporations.
With the annual PGA championship in Westchester County, N.Y., having moved 45 miles distant to Paramus, N.J., it may find ready takers.
The success of the Stamford outpost could help decide how well the Travelers Championship does in future years, including in the arena of charitable contributions that are a big part of the tournament”™s mission.
Of course, the better the tournament does in providing an attractive venue for corporations, the bigger purse it can offer to attract upper echelon players ”“ this year, the Traveler”™s Championship has a $6 million purse, the 16th richest of some 50 PGA tournaments scheduled for this year (the Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass this May is tops with $9.5 million in prize money).
Last year”™s Travelers champion Kenny Perry has committed to playing in June, as have Stewart Cink and Hunter Mahan who won the tournament the previous two years. The last time the tournament could boast an elite champion was in 2001 and 2002, however, when Phil Mickelson took home the trophies for what was then known as the Canon Greater Hartford Open.
The Travelers Championship occurs the week following the U.S. Open, both a curse in that some top echelon players take a break after the major, but also a possible blessing on the odds that a mid-level player mounts a serious challenge in the U.S. Open, bringing buzz into the Travelers the following week.
The Ashforth Co. donated office space to tournament organizers, which co-CEO Andy Ashforth said was the result of connections his company had with both Travelers and the Business Council of Fairfield County.
An avid golfer himself, Ashforth said that with Westchester Country Club no longer holding an annual tournament in Harrison, N.Y., it made sense for Travelers to extend its reach to Fairfield County to rope in past corporate supporters of the Westchester Classic.
Beleaguered General Motors Corp. wasn”™t the only company to hit the brakes on PGA sponsorships as a result of the recession. Last month, the Long Island, N.Y.-based software company CA Inc. said it was canceling its title support of the World Championship of Golf at Doral event in Florida. And after this year, New York City-based Verizon Communications Inc. is ending its title sponsorship of the Verizon Heritage tournament held in Greenville, S.C., along with some $8 million in support of the event.
The tour was not without its victories, however; RMS McGladrey, an accounting and consulting firm with a Stamford office, is sponsoring the new McGladrey Classic tournament this fall at Sea Island, Fla., at a reported commitment of between $4 million and $5 million. Farmers Insurance provided a financial backstop to save an annual tournament this past January at Torrey Pines in San Diego, and late last month committed to sponsoring the tournament another four years. And Nationwide Insurance recently renewed its umbrella sponsorship of the Nationwide Tour development league for golfers working their way toward a PGA championship.
General PGA sponsors include Westchester County, N.Y.-based MasterCard Worldwide and Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., the latter of which plans to move its headquarters to Stamford in 2012.
For the company that uses an umbrella as its corporate logo, Travelers reiterated its support for the most prominent sporting event held in Connecticut each year.
“The Travelers Championship has seen a great amount of success over the past three years, and there”™s room to grow,” said Andy Bessette, executive vice president and chief administrative officer of Travelers. “This tournament belongs to the entire state, and opening the office here in Stamford helps to raise awareness about the benefits the tournament can bring to charities, businesses and the community of Southern Connecticut.”
