Clipper Race ‘platform’ Hailed a Huge Success in Asia – Sir Robin Knox-Johnston

The Clipper Race has just left China for the 5,800 mile race across the mighty Pacific Ocean to the United States and a finish line set under the iconic Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. The focus over the past month for our partners has been on developing business, profiling consumer brands, attracting investment and tourists from South East Asia and China – where some of the world’s strongest economies are to be found with growth forecasts up to 7.5 percent per annum.

The Clipper Race operates a unique business model which creates a platform for consumer brand building, promotes international trade and tourism, and even extends to social and community engagement. The Chinese ‘Sailing City’ of Qingdao has been a partner of the race for ten years and hailed their sponsorship and hosting of the Clipper Race in five consecutive biennial events a huge success, not only for building international trade links and growing tourism, but also as a powerful legacy from staging the sailing competitions of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games – developing a sustainable sailing infrastructure, competitive calendar, youth training, leisure industry, marine business, boat building and associated supply chains.

It has worked extremely well for Qingdao and they credited the Clipper Race with providing a unique platform from which they have been able to achieve a wide range of objectives. Over the last ten years we have become part of each other’s stories. We have grown stronger together. We have made Qingdao famous around the world as China’s sailing city and they are now our longest consecutive race partner, having already committed to the 2015-16 edition of the Clipper Race, their sixth.

In the 2013-14 edition of the race other partner destinations that are sponsoring teams in addition to Qingdao include Switzerland, Jamaica, Invest Africa, Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The UK government has been particularly active in association with the GREAT Britain yacht and its team partners such as Land Rover.  The participation of the High Commissioner to Singapore, the Ambassador to China and ministerial attendance sends out a very strong message that they are serious about developing trade, attracting investment and boosting tourism.

The British Ambassador’s visit to our Chinese stopover was very well received and the UK brought a taste of Britain to Qingdao through its GREAT British Brands Showcase which also profiled our visit.  He told me that as the links between Britain and Qingdao grow through these sorts of initiatives, British brands and companies will be able to reach more consumers and develop more business-to-business opportunities. He also reinforced to the Chinese media the importance of the people to people exchanges and country to country communications facilitated through such initiatives as the Clipper Race

The Clipper Race attracts many UK and international brands and businesses that also activate in Asia and around the world, including Old Pulteney, Henri Lloyd, Garmin, PSP Logistics, Rockport Shoes, Rotary Watches and ARM Holdings.

In Singapore we had a new red Routemaster London bus on display, causing quite a stir; it’s built by Wrightbus in Northern Ireland, which is also developing an export market in Asia. The mayor of Derry-Londonderry reinforced his city’s commitment to telling their ‘new story’ to attract trade and tourism with Singapore and China. They are building on their success of participating in the 2011-12 edition of the race over the next four years.

Councillor Martin Reilly, told me how the city is moving forward after becoming the first UK City of Culture last year, growing their legacy with the Clipper Race to develop the local economy through the international reach and ‘door opening’ opportunities we create.

The Clipper Race has built a strong track record in this regard by hosting high level networking receptions; providing credible positioning in a major international event, including access to our partners and their guests; plus extensive and high profile media exposure.

If you want to sell your city you have to market it as if it is a brand, and that’s exactly what Derry-Londonderry is doing.  Here we have the Mayor getting in front of people and selling what a great place it is to invest, do business and visit and all these other things that help to excite the world to recognise the Derry-Londonderry brand, and that will bring business.

This is what you have to do if you want full employment in your city. They’re also enthusing our sponsors and the nations we visit to come to Derry-Londonderry for the festival that’s being planned when the Clipper Race arrives there in June when I know from our last visit, it’s going to be incredibly good.

It was also an historic moment in Anglo-Irish cooperation with the British Government the Irish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive staging their first joint trade mission, combined with the Clipper Race.

Northern Ireland Trade Minister Arlene Foster said that the city’s ‘continued participation in the Clipper Race is providing an unrivalled opportunity to raise the international profile of the city around the world.’

From past experience, the conversations started in Asia will seed developments which will grow over the coming months and years, but now, as the Clipper Race fleet passes below Japan and prepares to head out across the largest ocean on the planet, our sponsors’ thoughts are already turning to the United States and the hi tech and creative markets in the San Francisco Bay area.

So next month, in the April instalment on the 2013-14 edition of the Clipper Race for iSportconnect, I’ll take the opportunity to look at how new technology and digital media are changing the perception of sailing as we reach the waters which hosted the America’s Cup last summer to such great acclaim.

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It is 45 years since Sir Robin Knox-Johnston set off on his record breaking solo, non-stop circumnavigation in 1968-69. In 1995, he established the Clipper Race, to give everyone, regardless of sailing experience, the opportunity to discover the exhilaration of ocean racing.

Now the world’s longest ocean race, 670 amateur sailors representing more than 40 nations will compete in the Clipper 2013-14 Race. They set sail from London on September 1 and will travel 40,000 miles on twelve Clipper 70’s in 15 races across all six continents, not returning to London till July 2014.

Youcan follow the Clipper 2013-14 Race at www.clipperroundtheworld.com and on Twitter via @ClipperRace. Follow Sir Robin on Twitter @SirRKJ.

Sir Robin’s 

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