Tour de Georgia cancels 2009 race

For the second time this week, the tough economic climate has forced the cancellation of a major local sporting event for 2009. This time it’s the Tour de Georgia.

Unable to secure corporate sponsors for the seven-day cycling race that draws thousands of fans across the state, organizers have cancelled next year’s race, said Phil Jacobs, a member of the board of directors of the Tour de Georgia Foundation, which owns the race.

“We all know that many companies, corporations and many of our sponsors are into some pretty tough financial times right now,” he said. “While we didn’t have anyone say, ‘We’re not going to sponsor the race,’ it was clear there were going to be some organizations that needed to back off.”

The foundation will focus on planning a race for 2010, Jacobs said.

It’s not a good time to try and put together a sporting event that relies on corporate sponsors. Earlier this year, the LPGA, the professional women’s golf tour, was unable to secure a title sponsor for a local tournament in 2009.

And earlier this week, the men’s seniors professional golf tour announced that it was not holding a previously-announced event at Sugarloaf Country Club in Duluth because it could not secure a title sponsor. The seniors event was intended to replace a PGA Tour event at Sugarloaf that was killed because it too could not find a title sponsor.

Still, the Tour de Georgia news was a surprise because there was intense speculation that the sport’s international superstar, Lance Armstrong, was going to participate in the event. Armstrong recently announced he was coming out of retirement and planned to race in 2009. Armstrong participated in the 2005 Georgia Tour and had praised the event, first run in 2003.

If Armstrong had committed, would that have put the fund-raising over the top? “That’s a really tough question to answer,” Jacobs said. “And we never could get a firm commitment that he would be here.”

Even if Armstrong had committed to the race, it may not have been enough. It takes about $3.3 million to put on the race, Jacobs said. AT&T agreed to be the title sponsor for 2007 and paid $500,000. The state of Georgia also contributed $400,000. The race then secured eight other “founding sponsors” and 18 “official” sponsors.

AT&T did not commit for this year and organizers never even approached the state.

“I don’t think it would be wise for us to expect the state would be in again for $400,000, doing the kind of cuts they’re doing across other agencies,” Jacobs said. “Rather than press the issue, we thought it made more sense to target returning in 2010.”

Not every local event is suffering — and some companies are very happy with their event sponsorships.

The Tour Championship, the season-ending event for the PGA Tour, has Coca-Cola and the Southern Company signed through 2010, said Todd Rhinehart, the tournament’s executive director. Rhinehart would not say what Coca-Cola commitment is, but a title sponsorship for a PGA Tour event runs between $7 million and $8 million.

As with all its sponsorships, Coca-Cola cannot guarantee it will extend the Tour Championship contract, but the company likes to develop long-term partnerships with sporting events, Coca-Cola spokeswoman Susan Stribling said Friday.

Coca-Cola values the Tour Championship sponsorship both for its visibility in the sports world and its local connection, she said. East Lake Golf Club, where the tournament is held, has helped revitalize the area. In addition to sponsoring the tournament, Coca-Cola works with the East Lake Foundation and First Tee non-profit groups.

“For us, the focal point being on making a difference in the community is a big part of why we’re associated with the tournament,” Stribling said.

In addition to the main sponsors, the Tour Championship has contracts for $1.6 million from corporate clients. But the goal is $5 million, and “sales really started to slow down last summer ,” Rhinehart said. Rhinehart said he hopes the fact that the event is not until September 2009 might work in their favor. “If the economy starts turning around, companies may do some last minute buys,” he said.

The upcoming New Year’s Eve college football game formerly known as the Peach Bowl also has very happy title sponsor. Chick-fil-A has a rolling 5-year agreement as title sponsor of the bowl game that now bears its name, said Steve Robinson, Chick-fil-A’s senior vice president of marketing. Each year the contract is automatically renewed for another five years unless Chick-fil-A gives notice that it wants to end the relationship.

Chick-fil-A not only remains committed to the bowl game, but the Atlanta restaurant chain expanded its presence this year in college football, Robinson said. Chick-fil-A also was title sponsor of the Chick-fil-A College Kickoff, a game at the Georgia Dome between Alabama and Clemson in the first week of the season.

Chick-fil-A is finalizing a deal for a long-term sponsorship of the early season game, Robinson said. Chick-fil-A has focused on college sports to help introduce its products to new customers, he said. “It’s been a tremendous part of the effort to build the brand nationwide,” Robinson said. “Those two bowls are the crown jewels of that strategy.”

For the Tour de Georgia, there was little hope it could get a title sponsor. “It’s a very difficult time right now to raise money for any event,” Jacobs said. “Any non-profit or event-sponsorship, those types of things, companies in many cases are just struggling right now and going back to their core businesses. So we think by waiting a year and giving the economy hopefully a chance to begin to rebound, that we’re better off to look at 2010.”

Joe Guy Collier and Thomas Stinson also contributed to this article.