Saturday, October 04, 2008

Wachovia Championship News

"When it was announced Monday that Citigroup was taking over banking giant Wachovia, it set off alarm bells in Charlotte, N.C., where the highly popular and successful Wachovia Championship is held at Quail Hollow Club. (A subsequent bid for Wachovia came in from Wells Fargo.)

But this spring, the company signed a six-year extension with the PGA Tour to sponsor the tournament through 2014, and Wade expects that any new owner would honor the contract, although it remains uncertain whether the name of the tournament would change.

"With rare exceptions, we've not had anyone asking to get out," Wade said. "Or even asking for relief. We haven't had those requests, other than one or two minor ones. Not any more than we would have had in a good year."

There have been recent examples of companies getting out of contracts, such as 84 Lumber, which abruptly canceled its sponsorship of a tournament in Pennsylvania following the 2006 event; the tour quickly stepped in and replaced it with the Travelers Championship in Hartford, Conn. PODS opted out of its deal in Tampa after only two years, but tour officials were able to secure Transitions Inc., a lens company, to begin a four-year deal in 2009."

This excerpt was taken from the following link. To read the entire story go to:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/otl/columns/story?columnist=harig_bob&id=3619836

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