Business View Magazine | September 2022

140 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 9 destinations” With this rebranding, the name was changed to the Sports Events and Tourism Association, representing the wider market being served. “We made an acronym Sports ETA, and we’ve played on that, as we rebranded the entire organization. Changes included maximizing financial yield on current events, add an entirely new education platform, add new events focused on specific emerging areas of our industry and evolve our governance which included new bylaws that would widening the work and purpose we serve” says Kidd. Utilizing another acronym, EARN, which stands for Education, Advocacy, Research and Networking, the organization found purposeful focus and brought the association to where it is today. Growing the education offerings of Sports ETA to include as many areas of interest as possible was another part of the rebranding. As Kidd reports, “We have our own delivery system (Learning Management System – LMS) and our own education courses. We now can deliver our quality education and professional development 7/24. That’s one of the primary pillars we serve. We’re involved in professional development, leadership training, as well as accreditation for expertise and everything related to sports events and tourism inside our association and to the industry at large.” Advocacy, and making Sports ETA more relevant nationally became another priority of the association. “We put our foot to the ground significantly and have become a very ardent organization from a power standpoint, supporting states and national sport tourism,” describes Kidd. “That has been a significant impact that we’ve made across the country, which includes all the major tourism organizations from U.S. Travel Association to Destinations International and PCMA to name a few. We are now at the table with those guys, utilizing sports as one of the crucial vehicles that they need and want to enhance tourism in their destinations through sports.” Our state of the industry report in 2019 brought