Last night at Croke Park we held the first Sport for Business Networking Night. It was a great success with 150 people gathered from a wide range of sports and businesses to share, learn and improve the way they do and will in the future work together.
We gathered from over 20 National Governing Bodies of Sport in Ireland; from major sponsors and businesses looking to utilise sport in their own stakeholder plans; from stars on the pitch including Mike McCarthy, Scott Deasy and Alain Rolland; and from individuals and small businesses looking to find a niche within the business of sport.
The evening raised money for UNICEF, whose Irish Director Peter Power was on hand to thank those who were there.
We also had ‘spark’ discussions from Peter McKenna of the GAA, Dermot Rigley of RTE Sport, Joan O’Flynn of the Camogie Association, John McGrane from Ulster Bank and Liam Harbison of Paralympics Ireland.
The meeting split into small groups who each addressed a variety of questions ranging from sports marketing to digital engagement and whether it was better to support a tournament, team or individual athlete.
We will make the responses from their discussions available tomorrow and on Monday here on the Sport for Business website.
Our thanks to all those who made it possible and especially those of you who made it such a great night, to our partners the GAA, UNICEF and Nutritics and to the organisers if #SBWeek in the US who pulled together a global network of events of which we were the Irish end. We will be shortly announcing details of similar events to take place in Cork and Belfast but for now let us leave you with the words of some of those who were there and who were happy to share their thoughts through social media…
“An inspiring meeting of minds.”
“This is how a networking event should be run. Imaginative, innovative and really got the room working.”
“Great evening of chat, debate and banter on all things sport”
“Great night of ideas around fan engagement and Women in sport. Thanks”
“Great to get in touch with the Irish sports world tonight.”
“Thoroughly enjoyable, educational and valuable evening.”
“Really interesting evening of Sport and Business networking.”
