Sponsoring of art and culture by banks in the Netherlands

The connection between the corporate world and the cultural world is a difficult one, because both worlds have very different values and objectives. Nevertheless connections are made. This thesis is about the connection between Dutch banks (financials) and the cultural sector in the Netherlands, the connection that is talked about here are sponsorships. This connection between the financials and the cultural sector is not something new, but is present for a few decades. It started in the 1970’s with the art collections of the different financials and in the 1990 the sponsoring of the arts emerged. This thesis focuses on the five largest banks in the Netherlands, these are: ABN-AMRO, Rabobank, ING, Fortis and the BNG. All these banks have sponsorships with cultural institutions in the Netherlands except for the BNG with uses a fund to support the arts. The Fortis also uses a fund next to their sponsor activities, the VSB fund. From the literature a model can be made from which motivations for the sponsoring of arts and for corporate philanthropy can be deducted. The motivations for sponsoring and corporate philanthropy are: For engaging in a sponsorship - promoting image or name of the company - increasing employee commitment - increasing suppliers/clients loyalty - rent seeking For corporate philanthropy - Non monetary benefits for managers or owners of the company - Good corporate citizenship - Lobbying for goodwill from society These motivations where given to the different financials by means of a survey. The financials could then give the matter of applicability for each motivation. Not only were they asked for the applicability for arts sponsorships, but also for sports sponsorships and for causes in society. Next to this survey qualitative interviews were held with the ING, the BNG and with the VSB fund in order to get some more detailed information. The results of the survey tells us that the main motive for engaging in a sponsorship with the arts is the promotion of the image, next is the increasing of suppliers/clients loyalty (hospitality) and for the arts the good corporate citizenship also applies. For sports sponsorship the promotion and the hospitality motives are the most important and for causes in society the good corporate citizenship is the most important motive. These results tell us that the sponsoring of art is a commercial activity but that the altruistic motivations are also applicable, but not as much as when it comes to causes in society. From the in depth interviews and also from the survey it becomes clear that the sponsorships of financials with cultural institutions are behaving more like a partnership that as a sponsorship. Both parties are trying to work extensively together and are trying to achieve something. This can be explained as a positive development, but cultural institutions must be very careful when making these type of deals, because they might get into something they do not fully understand and then the relationship is no longer equal. This has influence on the outcome of the deal. Caution must be taken when arranging sponsorships with cultural institutions, because the connection between two different words can be problematic.