Measuring the Affiliated Sports Club Market Submitted to: Fraser Skilling Senior Programme Manager Sport England Submitted by: Professor Simon Shibli & David Barrett Sport Industry Research Centre Sheffield Hallam University Sheffield, S10 2BP Tel: +44 (0)114 225 5919 Email: [email protected] 15th November, 2017 Contents Contents ............................................................................................................................................................. 2 Executive Summary.......................................................................................................................................... 3 Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................ 6 1 Research Context ..................................................................................................................................... 6 1.1 The political context .......................................................................................................................... 6 2 Our Approach ............................................................................................................................................ 6 2.1 Data Processing ................................................................................................................................ 7 2.2 Cross-Referencing ............................................................................................................................ 8 2.2 Geocoding .......................................................................................................................................... 8 Key Points .................................................................................................................................................. 9 3 Results ...................................................................................................................................................... 10 3.1 Initial Findings.................................................................................................................................. 10 Key Points ................................................................................................................................................ 13 3.2 Local Authority Level ...................................................................................................................... 13 Key Points ................................................................................................................................................ 16 3.3 County Sports Partnership Level .................................................................................................. 17 Key Points ................................................................................................................................................ 20 3.4 Deprivation Level ............................................................................................................................ 20 Key Points ................................................................................................................................................ 22 4 Constraints and Limitations ................................................................................................................... 22 4.1 What Constitutes a Club? .............................................................................................................. 22 4.2 Data Protection and Sharing ......................................................................................................... 22 4.3 Limitations of CSP Data ................................................................................................................. 23 4.4 Mapping Constraints ...................................................................................................................... 23 Key Points ................................................................................................................................................ 24 5 Conclusions and Recommendations ................................................................................................... 24 Appendix .......................................................................................................................................................... 26 2 Executive Summary 1 Research Context Various attempts have been made to estimate the size of the sports club market in England, both directly and indirectly through other research. The need for high quality data relating to the size of the sports club market is highlighted by the wide variation between these estimates. Clubs are at the heart of the Core Market and therefore it is important that Sport England has the fullest intelligence possible on an area in which it will invest considerably over the next four years. 2 Our Approach The SIRC team used a similar approach to the Ecorys research, by contacting National Governing Bodies of sport directly to access their database of affiliated clubs. In all cases the research team agreed access on the understanding that as data 'owners', NGBs retained the right to decide what data could be shared, and how it could be used. The final dataset includes records of clubs affiliated to 95 NGBs, covering 85 sports. 3 Results 3.1 Initial Findings On the basis of the data gathered for this research, there are 74,233 sports clubs affiliated to English or English-based NGBs. Of these, 66,157 were mapped within England, and a further 1,898 clubs which were affiliated to the same NGBs were located outside the country (3% of the total). Scaling up to the overall sample gives an estimated figure of 72,117 (97% 0f 74,233). The ten most popular sports are responsible for 67% of the clubs affiliated to English or English-based governing bodies, with the next ten sports accounting for a further 16%. Clubs in four sports (Football, Cricket, Bowls and Tennis) make up just over half of all sports clubs in England. 3.2 Local Authority Level Eight of the top 20 councils in terms of the number of sports clubs, are unitary authorities corresponding roughly to traditional county boundaries, while the remaining 12 are metropolitan boroughs. An analysis of raw counts at local authority is useful, but by standardising for population size, it is possible to make a more meaningful comparison between areas, and reveals a different pattern in terms of club provision. The 20 local authorities with the fewest clubs are predominantly, but not exclusively, in remote rural areas. When standardised by population a different story emerges, with provision of clubs per 100,000 people highest in the two smallest authorities (Scilly and the City of London). In contrast, Kensington and Chelsea has the lowest number of clubs per 100,000 of any local authority in the country. 3.3 County Sports Partnership Level At County Sports Partnership level, the pattern of club provision is simpler to determine. With the exception of Devon, all of the top ten CSPs are located either in the South East or around Northern Metropolitan cities. The capital accounts for 9% of all clubs, while the top ten CSPs account for 40% of England's clubs overall. Standardising by population paints an entirely different picture of provision. The ratio of clubs per 100,000 people is lowest in Birmingham and London, while the highest figures are in Avon (Westport) and Shropshire. 3 3.4 Deprivation Level The use of postcode data to locate affiliated clubs also permits an analysis of distribution by deprivation, as clubs can be mapped to the 2015 Indices of Multiple Deprivation. This presents an opportunity to consider the impact of deprivation levels on access to sports clubs. In the majority of the most popular sports, there is a tendency for clubs to be located in less deprived areas. There are few sports which run counter to this trend, though boxing is a notable exception, with almost three quarters of affiliated clubs located in the most deprived parts of England. 4 Constraints and Limitations The processes and procedures involved in compiling the data for this research were designed to provide a comprehensive dataset which could be mapped and analysed in a variety of ways. The exercise was successful in gathering data on a significant number of clubs from a wide variety of sports, but the research operated under a number of limitations. 4.1 What Constitutes a Club? NGBs in different sports continue to define their 'clubs' differently. There are also significant differences between NGBs in the way they compile and maintain data relating to their clubs. Nevertheless, there are a number of examples of good practice, and the desire to maintain or move towards Open Data standards was noted by several NGBs. 4.2 Data Protection and Sharing The Data Protection Act 1998 was cited by a number of governing bodies and CSPs as a constraint on the sharing of club data. A small number of NGBs remained reluctant to share data for an exercise of this nature, particularly those which had invested a significant amount of their own resources in producing club databases. Most governing bodies and CSPs contacted during the data collection phase of the study shared data directly with the team, but some preferred to direct SIRC researchers towards resources posted on their websites. Data on NGB websites is subject to error, omission and formatting issues, all of which require time