First things first. I'm not asking for the UG mob to jump down this guys throat... yet. I'm looking for some opinions on whether you think we're getting screwed or not.
My brother and I both fought on AFC 16: Uprising last month. We had a sponsorship agreement with Vicious Clothing for $500 that would get them both of us wearing his T shirt and Hat for our walk out, the Vicious logo on the banner which would hang in our gym after the fight is over, and the logo on our website (aboout 1200-1500 hits per month)
There were two problems on our end, neither of which we had any control over... There was supposed to be an internet PPV of the event, but the bandwidth at the venue wouldn't support it (The event will be released as an On Demand PPV at Go Fight Live.tv) and our banner was lost on the flight to the fights.
Because of this the guy who owns the company hasn't paid. I agreed that maybe a full payment wasn't in order but that we needed to work something out. He's been dodging me for weeks now. Won't give me a straight answer
We still wore the clothing for walk out and weigh ins which will be seen on the PPV (AFC also airs in Canada on the Fight Network) the banner is hanging in our gym and the logo/link is on our website ( www.steelcitymma.ca ). So this guy has got a bunch of advertising for free.
$500 might not seem like a lot but it's the money we used to fly our cornerman out for the fights.
I also have a long facebook exchange over the last few weeks of the owner avoiding the topic of payment.
What say you UG/OG? Screw job or is the owner right to not pay because the original agreement wasn't 100% met?
Sorry to hear that your sponsor is so cheap. This doesn't really help you to recover that money, but two things I'd suggest for the future:
-Don't make sponsor agreements that have contingencies the sponsor can use to back out of paying you. Or at least ask for half of the money prior to the bout so that if they have a quibble with whether the terms were met, they can't leave you with nothing.
-Never rely on GoFightLive, they're awful. Their MMA streams rarely reach more than a hundred people or so, and that's only when they're working correctly, which is no guarantee. They don't put any money into the events they cover, so there's little incentive for the venue to ensure GFL has a stable uplink to stream the show.
Hey Smoog, definitely a few lessons learned about sponsorship agreements. As for GFL.tv that was the site that the AFC uses, out of my hands, and it seems to have worked well for them in the past. This particular venue just didn't have the wireless bandwidth to stream from there.
problem is, if your agreement was sponsorship and it was a ppv event, if that didnt happen you don't have much to bargain with.
If you signed a contract i'd reaad it very carefully, but I wouldn't expect much, if anything if the problem was the event didn't do ppv.
truth is, you lost the banner and the event never even hit ppv, your payment is probably going to be the value of the clothes you got.
contractually your agreement was based on exposure, and if you can't prove there was any, you don't have much to back you up. unless you signed an agreement which gave you a set guarantee.
I hope they pay you something but once you loose the banner and don't hold up part of your deal and the show doesn't air as it should it kinda voids the agreement.
Thanks guys, I pretty much agree with most of you that a full payment isn't necessarilly in order, but something should be. I even voiced as much to the owner.
My two biggest issues are that 1) He has received free advertising (A few thousand people at the event, AFC airs on the fight network, banner on website and in gym) 2) He is dip, duck, dodge, dive and dodging the issue and not responding to my messages.
Humphrey - how many people actually saw the event?
problem is, if your agreement was sponsorship and it was a ppv event, if that didnt happen you don't have much to bargain with.
If you signed a contract i'd reaad it very carefully, but I wouldn't expect much, if anything if the problem was the event didn't do ppv.
truth is, you lost the banner and the event never even hit ppv, your payment is probably going to be the value of the clothes you got.
contractually your agreement was based on exposure, and if you can't prove there was any, you don't have much to back you up. unless you signed an agreement which gave you a set guarantee.
Well he can prove he gave his sponsor exposure, he has his logo on his website, they wore the clothing which will still be put to DVD. I think half the payment is in order.
Humphrey - how many people actually saw the event?
problem is, if your agreement was sponsorship and it was a ppv event, if that didnt happen you don't have much to bargain with.
If you signed a contract i'd reaad it very carefully, but I wouldn't expect much, if anything if the problem was the event didn't do ppv.
truth is, you lost the banner and the event never even hit ppv, your payment is probably going to be the value of the clothes you got.
contractually your agreement was based on exposure, and if you can't prove there was any, you don't have much to back you up. unless you signed an agreement which gave you a set guarantee.
Well he can prove he gave his sponsor exposure, he has his logo on his website, they wore the clothing which will still be put to DVD. I think half the payment is in order.
I meant to "on demand" not DVD. Can't edit, on phone.
UPDATE: I think he got some heat from a few people who heard about this and sent me a message today saying he would pay a portion of what we agreed on. I think his offer was more than fair. You can put your pitchforks and molotov cocktails away.
UPDATE: I think he got some heat from a few people who heard about this and sent me a message today saying he would pay a portion of what we agreed on. I think his offer was more than fair. You can put your pitchforks and molotov cocktails away.
Only good will could come from immediately paying the full $500. He'd be loved by you and I'm sure would get future exposure AND he wouldn't be seen as a bit of a dick by the UG mob. I don't understand the short sightedness of guys like this.
