“Orange Is the New Green” is the name of a new project for environmental sustainability presented on July 6, 2020 during an official event organized by Serie C side Pistoiese, in the beautiful setting of the Vannucci Piante Nursery Campus in Pistoia.
The project was born from an idea of four students (Massimo Rosi, Enrico Saladino, Jacopo Bellantonio and Francesco Viani) from the MBA Master’s Degree in Sports Management at the University of Real Madrid. The orange refers to the social colors of Pistoiese, the team to which the project was applied, and the green refers to the environment.
The project aims at mixing the two colors to create a modern and innovative football club, one that cares as much about their sporting results on the pitch as they do about their social commitments outside of it.
The first substantial part of the project consisted in studying the city reality and the financial / structural situation of the team in order to identify areas of weakness to minimize them, possible opportunities to be exploited, as well as the entire ecosystem in which the company operates.
Pistoiese turned out to be primarily an economically sustainable company, something that should not be taken for granted in today’s Italian third division. The club has managed to have a balanced budget at the end of each sporting season, saw its assets constantly increasing and its revenue growing continuously since its return to professional football.
Nonetheless, from an analysis of Pistoiese’s corporate financial statements, it emerged that the different revenue streams are rather fluctuating from season to season: Their sponsorship contracts (which represent about 35% of revenue for the 2019-20 season) are mostly local and short term (with the exception of main sponsor Vannucci Piante, close to reaching a longevity record in the field of football partnerships) and create the need to research and re-negotiate the different agreements each year – which makes planning for the future more complex.
Revenue from ticketing (about 10% of the total) is very volatile and largely dependent on the results obtained in the field. Revenues deriving from merchandising is, on the other hand, practically non-existent and in any case does not impact the company financial statements.
The only more stable source of income over the years has been represented by the contributions from the Lega Pro – the third division league – which constituted about 55% of last year’s revenue. Thanks to their contant use of players from the youth selection national teams, Pistoiese are the fifth team when it comes to benefits received in the year 2019-2020 until the season was stopped due to COVID-19.
These assumptions, together with the awareness that a modern football club must promote issues that go beyond sport itself, generated the idea of translating the values of eco-sustainability and respect for the environment into the local society and make them the main characteristic of the city of Pistoia – which is already recognized as the Italian capital of plants thanks to the large number of nursery companies within its territory.
The goal is to create a team that can acts as a spokesperson for such values within the Italian football and sports scene – which is not very attentive to the topic and very slow to embrace it compared to the other major European leagues – thus becoming a true reference point in the sector.
As is the case with many projects of the same mold, the first step was taken within the company by promoting the awareness and the acquisition of a new green spirit, as well as with the implementation of some basic best practices.
The next step will consist in organizing some concrete activities to be carried out among and with the people to raise awareness and disseminate the idea within the territory. All this will be in collaboration with Pistoiese’s commercial and institutional partners, who will benefit from a positive return of image, and with the constant involvement of fans and citizens in general, who will benefit from a much more present team than in the past.
When it comes to the football itself, some particular attention will be paid to the development of the youth sector – which is already well structured – with the creation of a special orange academy that will aim at becoming a real hotbed for local talents.
The project has already obtained the patronage of the Municipality of the city of Pistoia, a sign of the concrete interest that society and the community have in similar initiatives. The financial objective is to obtain a considerable return of image so as to attract the attention of new potential investors already active in the green field or even of subjects who have not yet implemented this transformation and are willing to link their own image with that of an eco-sustainable club.
The social goal, on the other hand, is to offer some activities to fans and the community in a more constant way, influencing their habits and obtaining results and benefits that can have a positive impact on the environment.
All in all, the project aims at achieving an increase and stabilization of revenue deriving from sponsorships and ticketing, with an increase in partnership agreements and above all a boost in the interest of the community towards Pistoiese.
The estimated growth, net of a 25% decline for the next football season due to the current health situation, is expected to bring the business levels back to where they were prior to the pandemic by the 2021-22 season and to result in a 15% approximate annual growth for the 3 following seasons, not to mention the countless social benefits that would derive in parallel.
A green project, in a green environment, for a team that aims at becoming “green” itself.
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Read more from Marco Perrotta on https://naples-football-city.com