The Consumer Market And

Mass Participation Events

An Opportunity For

Athletics?

Steven Seaton

Runner’s World

Runner’s World is the world’s largest media vehicle on

and off-line in the specialist running space

• We publish magazines,

websites and books in 15

countries around the world, 9 of

which are European

• We are more than publishers

we put on events, holidays,

training camps and offer on-line

training and coaching

• To understand our reach in the

UK we sell 94500 copies and

have 525,000 members on our

website

• All of our products are aimed at

practitioners - people who are

running rather than watching

others doing it

We are about the activity of running more than the

sport - but the sport remains part of the editorial mix

We’ve never had it so good

• Running is booming.

• There has never been a better

time to be involved in the

business of running

• We don’t know how many

runners there are but … races

and race entrants are at

historically high levels as are

every empirical measurement

connected with running

• This is a worldwide not just a

European phenomenon

Who’s The New Runner?

• He’s probably male,

married, middle-aged,

middle class

• He’s an affluent, well

educated, relatively high

powered goal-orientated

individual

• He’s often a second-sport

runner

• Running isn’t a hobby

pastime it’s part of his life

• It’s a positive statement

about him as an

individual

He’s running on his terms, when it suits him to fit in

with the demands and stresses of his life

But it’s no longer just a male pursuit

And times and performance are less important than

fun or other reasons to run

What of the sport of running or athletics?

• It’s struggling

• Standards are falling, numbers joining the sport through traditional

areas are in decline

• The sport and its administration is increasingly an irrelevance to the

mass of ‘fun’ runners or joggers flooding into the sport

Why isn’t the sport capitalising on the new runner?

• The sport’s administrators don’t understand their motivations

• The new runners are too old to fit into the traditional performance pyramid

• Outside of events they’re hard to identify and find

• The new runners think of athletics as an elitist pursuit

• They don’t appear to need or want anything

• Others are already catering for their needs

Why should you be engaging with these runners?

• It’s not an opportunity is an

imperative

• They’re the mass market and

the numbers are only going to

grow

• They’re affluent … although

they’re discerning shoppers

• They’re an upmarket consumer

and more influential that you

imagine

• Many of them are parents eager

to introduce their children to

their sport

How do you engage with them?

• Understand the power of marketing

• Accept that the rules of the game have changed

• Find out what they want not what you want to give or take them

• Be more creative and broaden your areas of expertise

• Embrace the technological world

Understand the power of marketing

HellRunner

• Cross-country V Adventure

Running

• How Hell Runner reinvented an

old idea and made 10 miles of

tough, demanding cross-country

a compelling proposition

• 2003 one race 800 people,

2009 five races 10,000 people

The rules of the game have changed

British Military Fitness

• UK running clubs are the traditional access point into the sport

• They are largely a passive force

• The new clubs are replacing them they’re gyms, running shops,

companies or BMF groups

• BMF puts on daily training classes, events, has social evenings

and singles nights

Find out what they want not what you want

to give or take them

• Race for Life is the biggest race series in the UK

• In 2009 735,000 women took part in their races and it’s the best

beginners running programme in the UK

• The series should have been embraced and supported by the

governing body, but they fell out over the unaffiliated levy

• It didn’t need UKA to operate, viewed them merely as a tax authority

and now operates completely outside the sport

Be more creative, but don’t forget the

obvious stuff

• It’s a consumer market, the new runners don’t necessarily need anything but they’ll buy into the right ideas and products

• There are countless opportunities to engage with this audience

• ParkRuns offer weekly, 5K timed free runs open to all ages and abilities

• Started in 2003 in with 13 runners and now has dozens of events all of UK with over 30,000 registered on its database

• It’s a community project, you sign up once on the website and then you just turn up and run at any of the events.

Embrace the technological world

• On-line presents a whole new range of

opportunities to engage quickly and

effectively with this new audience

• The virtual club is a growing phenomenon

• Fetcheveryone.com is the second biggest

on-line running site in the UK

• It started as a evening project for a

committed but untalented runner and it

was purchased by Runner’s World in

2007 and now operates as a successful

profitable business

• It is a site where you keep a record of

your running activities and then analyse

and discuss your running with others

• Over 35,000 registered members use the

site every

The mass participation

market isn’t just an

opportunity it’s an

imperative

You have to engage

with this market or you

will make yourselves

irrelevant

Thank you