THE BUSINESS OF PASSION: A GLOBAL INDUSTRY ANALYSIS OF SPORTS MARKETING AND SPONSORSHIP

Date of Award

5-2026

Document Type

Senior Project

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts (BA)

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Ingram, Marcus

Area of Concentration

Economics

Abstract

The global sports sponsorship industry has emerged as one of the most economically significant and analytically complex segments of the modern marketing economy. Despite generating revenues projected to surpass $160 billion by 2030, the industry remains undertheorized in academic economics literature, which has tended to treat sponsorship as a subset of marketing strategy rather than as a distinct economic system warranting rigorous structural analysis. This thesis addresses that gap. This study advances the following central argument: the economic value of sports sponsorship is not primarily a function of audience scale or brand visibility, but is instead constituted through the intersection of emotional fan loyalty, strategic market concentration, and the behavioral mechanisms that translate affective engagement into durable consumer preference. As a consequence, traditional return-on-investment frameworks systematically undervalue sponsorship by neglecting its role in building long-term brand equity and identity alignment. The analysis proceeds in two parts. Part I examines the structural architecture of the global sports sponsorship industry, mapping its value chain, identifying its principal actors, and charting the macroeconomic trends—including globalization, digital transformation, and the emergence of new sports properties—that are reshaping competitive dynamics. Part II applies a suite of formal economic frameworks to explain the behavioral and strategic logic underlying these structures, drawing on the Structure–Conduct–Performance model, game theory, labor economics and human capital theory, behavioral demand theory, and price discrimination. Additional insights from innovation economics and international trade theory illuminate the industry's technological and global dimensions.

Taken together, these two approaches demonstrate that sports sponsorship constitutes a derived industry whose growth is fundamentally conditioned by the expansion of the global sports ecosystem and the quality of fan attention it commands. The thesis contributes to a growing literature at the intersection of sports economics, industrial organization, and marketing theory by offering a unified analytical framework capable of explaining both the industry's current structure and its likely evolutionary trajectory.

Rights

The author has not granted New College of Florida the nonexclusive right to archive, make accessible, and distribute for educational purposes this work in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The copyright of this work remains with the author.

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