HEAD of Leep Marketing and athlete brand manager, Tanya Lee Perkins said the endorsement model will be one to watch in the track and field sector in the coming months, as athletes seek to grow their net worth in the profession.

Speaking on Taking Stock with Kalilah Reynolds recently, Lee Perkins said while there are several variables at play when it comes to athletes’ funding endorsement deals continue to be big-ticket items, especially for the more successful players.

“Usain [Bolt] made 30 times more through endorsements than what he made on the track, so I think that’s the model for the future,” she said, while pointing out that athletes have been making anywhere from US$20,000 or into the millions depending on negotiations, their status, brand, performances, social media following, among other things.

“There are so many variables that go into it but you can earn big. When you think of the way a track and field athlete earns, it’s going to be on the circuit, their contract and through their endorsement deals,” said Lee Perkins.

“Where I think track and field can go, and a lot of track athletes aren’t there yet, is the LeBron model, the Messi model, the CR7 [soccer cleats] model. Yes, those are bigger sports globally in terms of basketball and football, but certainly a track athlete should think that they can make multiples off endorsement deals,” she said.

Lee Perkins was speaking against the background of the Olympics, which offers no form of payout to participants. At the same time, she said the event remains important for the athletes as it will help to elevate their status and determine their financial future at least for the next four years.

For instance, all athletes who compete at the Olympics walk away with the right to include the letters OLY at the end of their names.

“They’re looking at performing well so you make it into the top 10 in the world, so that you get a lane on the Diamond League circuit, so that you get a lane in the World Challenge Grand Prix meets — and that’s going to be very important in terms of the athletes’ earning potential,” she said.

Still, many are challenged to even get to the Olympics in the first place. It’s why Perkins wants corporate entities to also consider investing in athletes along their journey to help them realise their dreams.

“I know a lot of corporations are sponsoring the Olympics now but think about the journey for a lot of these athletes because most of them don’t have sponsors, they don’t have a huge athletic contract. The majority of our athletes work on sponsorship grants through the Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA), and some are subsidised by the Government through INSPORTS,” she explained.

In the local context, athletes who have received corporate sponsorship and endorsement deals in recent times include Elaine Thompson Herah, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pyce, Brianna Williams, Hansle Parchment and Julian Forte. Lee Perkins said companies like Digicel, Flow, GraceKennedy and Wisynco have made deals with these athletes based on their brand, their following and their performances.

Some of these athletes also have multimillion-dollar and multi-year deals with international companies such as Nike, Puma and Adidas.

Retired sprinter Warren Weir was one of those athletes who received an endorsement contract from Adidas straight out of high school. That contract, he said, allowed him to cover his basic living expenses and pay for training.

“A lot of people don’t know that when you get a contract from these sporting companies, they pay your coach, so I didn’t have to pay my coach out of my pocket,” he disclosed.

Weir said while the endorsements concept remains fairly fresh in Jamaica it has been evolving, with a noticeable trend of smaller companies moving to sponsor upcoming athletes and not just those more popular because of their achievements on the big stages.

“We’re getting there, we’re growing. We’re no longer just a country that sponsors elite athletes during a certain time of the year,” he said.

Weir, who launched his company Weirz World Media even before hanging up his spikes, said he was happy to see that athletes are now doing more with social media when it comes to their brand. He said he has been imploring others still in the profession to leverage the platform for its benefits for when they too enter into retirement.

“I say to athletes all the time, ‘If you’re not going to school and you have a skill or a talent, let people know of that talent while you’re still in your phase’….track and field is a very short span so we have to think and manage our money very carefully while we’re actually running,” he said.

Several athletes, local and international, have started banking on different ventures outside of track and field to ensure they have options to fall back on when they retire. Here in Jamaica, athletes have gone into hospitality, health and wellness, cosmetics and clothing.