The Addicted Association
...hooked on suppliers and sponsors  

Wherever you turn in the association world, it seems that the dollars derived from suppliers and sponsors are becoming the opiate of choice. 

Let me be clear! I do not believe that there is anything wrong with having supplier members or sponsors, however I do believe there is something wrong with how the dependence on these revenue sources is distorting the way associations operate and the value they are delivering (or more precisely, not delivering).

Everywhere I look I see organizations twisting themselves into pretzels in an effort to maintain and increase their sponsorship and other supplier revenues.

When they secure even more revenues, the need increases for more yet...always more! 

In major professional sports, the sponsorship, advertising and television revenues dwarf the revenues created by fans. Teams need popular and competitive teams so they overspend on player contracts. After all, what is better than having one of the marketable stars on the team? Teams spend so much money in this attempt to appeal to the television networks and advertisers that they must increase ticket prices beyond reason. Rather than the "product" creating the demand, the hype and flash of TV networks, advertisers and sponsors creates the illusion of demand.

With associations, I think that some conferences are similar to this outrageous sports model. The conference is designed to secure more and more revenue from sponsors, advertisers, exhibitors and supplier members rather than accomplishing its original purpose...to deliver education and other value to members at a reasonable price. As with sports ticket prices, conference fees are becoming too expensive for the value received.  

Often the goal of increasing conference attendance has more to do with increasing exposure or traffic for those paying the bills rather than as an indicator that value is being delivered to members.

In my view, the biggest problem with the growing desire and need for these types of revenues is that the revenue is not used to create a better value-creating organization appealing to more members, but rather in a desperate quest for the next monetary "fix".

I also believe that this is not sustainable. If the value of the product drops too low, members stop coming. Finally, the sponsor and supplier dollars drop off. Then the pain begins!

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