PRESS RELEASE: The underfunded women who hold up the fort for others

Australia went into a frenzy after the Matildas Success, with Anthony Albanese Pledging $200 Million to upgrade sports facilities for women.

We’ve got a big spotlight on womens sport right now, but let’s look at a couple of sports towing the line and where we are seeing inequality within.

Skateboarding
Skateboarding lent itself to the Olympics to assist them with plugging the ratings decline in the games. Its first year in Tokyo had amazing ratings, and has since been included as a mainstay.

Despite its role to hold up declining sports, these women (in a sport of up to 1 million recreational users in Australia) find sponsors go silent when the cheque book is mentioned.

It’s not unfamiliar with the Amateur and Pro Leagues in Australia, with their 15 year history never having an overall Womens partner for the leagues.

A number of women are having to decide whether to compete at the Olympics due to budgets, or are having the decision made for them due to finances.

Breakdancing
Breakdancing is coming in to Paris 2024, for, you guessed it, to help grow ratings and plug the decline.
Australia has amazing break talent, and a similar story to skateboarding repeating itself.

The Common story
The fast food ads with breakdancers and skateboarders all over them, as they connect to a huge audience, only for the fast food company to then send all its money to Cricket or somewhere else. Heck, they’ll even run an ad with skateboarders on it during the cricket.

Taking from a culture to commercialise is a rough trot. It must be a tough place where other sports need breakdancing and skateboarding to show their commercial value.

These sports also have quite high female participation, and have had equal prize money for over a decade. The Equal prize money came from the men sacrificing 50% of their pool, not from sponsorship. It also goes to show how inclusive the environments are, and for individual sports, they all act like a united team.

If these sports and their culture are needed (by other sports) to boost revenue and ratings, It would be kind of them to share some support back to the culture and grassroots itself.

While the story above is on both overall sports, what is amazing is the females receive significant less endorsements, and with the advocacy for womens sport, it’s interesting to see that when the hands out for these future sports to support their women, the chequebook gets put away.

The concern with advocacy for Womens sport in marketing is that investing in sport is a charitable cause, not just advertising, so when these heavy hitters pulling their weight aren’t being supported, we’re seeing the support go to Women in much better places than those holding up the roof.

We asked the skateboarding women what they would like out of the $200 million fund for facilities, they said they would just like a tap, a toilet in general, or some shade at skateparks.
You don’t need to look far that most skateparks have one dead tree, which is normally the toilet at the facility. Unfortunately for the females, they can’t use it, and need to leave practice to go find one somewhere.

When you see a female skateboarder or breakdancer in public, don’t be afraid to yell out ‘ thank you for your service’

To Discuss Further please reach out,
We have 1 Womens Athlete Manager, 1 Female Skateboarder, 1 Female Breakdancer all available to contribute