Naming sponsor sought for Clearwater Arena

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The City of Sarnia has been trying for the past six years to find naming rights sponsors for some of its assets with limited success.

City council earlier this month agreed to try again.

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Naming sponsor sought for Clearwater Arena Back to video

Council approved inviting expressions of interest to purchase naming rights to Clearwater Arena – in line to be made more of a community hub with the pending relocation of the Mallroad library and proposed renovations to include a new transit terminal.

The aim is to start small, said city treasurer Holly Reynolds, who wrote the report to council.

“Let’s see what interest is out there, let’s see whether the city actually can do this and then learn from that,” she said about the approach.

In 2015, a third-party report to council estimated about $1.7 million per year could be generated with sponsorships for city assets, including the city’s flagship Progressive Auto Sales Arena, previously the RBC Centre and Sarnia Sports and Entertainment Centre.

A 10-year, $434,000 sponsorship there was inked with Progressive Auto Sales in 2016.

But a five-year contract struck with a local advertising and marketing term later that year to find more sponsors for city assets has not resulted in “significant” revenues, Reynolds said, noting that agreement has since ended.

Minimums of $5,000 to $25,000 per year were included in the contract.

Even the naming rights for the arena were hard-won after the city issued two calls for proposals and received no responses, Reynolds noted in her report.

Progressive and LiUNA were the only two to present bids and did so outside of the city’s call-for-proposals window.

It’s been the city’s experience there’s not a lot of interest in purchasing naming rights for city assets, Reynolds said, noting why isn’t clear.

If there’s no interest in the naming rights at Clearwater, the arena-turning-community hub could just keep its name, she said.

If, conversely, there is a lot of interest, the city can start to look at selling sponsorships for individual ice pads, dressing rooms, referee rooms and other assets such as tennis courts and pavilions, she added.

“There’s a lot that might be monetized but there’s a lot of work involved in taking it down to that granular level,” she said. “The city doesn’t have that skill set on staff at the moment or the time or the resources to be able to undertake that.”

Hiring to get that sort of work done would likely be more expensive than the revenue it generates, she said.

“It’s very, very unlikely the city would come anywhere close to a revenue figure that would result in more benefits than costs,” she said.

Hence the recommendation to start small, she said.

Going further would require a “robust strategy on what will be marketed and how those assets will be monetized,” her report to council said, noting further recommendations are pending based on what happens with Clearwater.

Wording updates were also made to the city’s policies for sponsorships and renaming city property, with the biggest change allowing the chief administrator and general managers at the city to accept sponsorship proposals up to $50,000.

Previously, the limit was capped at $5,000 before applications would have to come to council for consideration.

“We realized the amount was just too low to be functional,” Reynolds said.

Authority for approval by senior staff would apply to things such as a sponsorship for a tall ships festival, Reynolds said, noting everything would still be reported publicly.

Anything that would involve renaming a building would come to council for approval.

The revised sponsorships policy is open for public input until Oct. 8, and the renaming policy until Oct. 18, at speakupsarnia.ca.

The policies come back to council for consideration Oct. 25.

tkula@postmedia.com