Double fault: Ignoring the Middle East market

When the cameras stop flashing tonight at the All England Club and the newly crowned men's singles champion makes his way down the tunnel with his £700,000 (Dh5.1 million) cheque, the finance wizards of Wimbledon will be quite content.

The Championships have been around since 1877, but never before have they experienced such a targeted marketing drive, producing profits far in excess of the £11.8m prize fund. With Wimbledon being Britain's most watched sports event, perhaps the most surprising observation is that the increased revenue is coming not from the UK, but from further afield.

According to a report published in The Guardian newspaper, 'Brand Wimbledon' reached China in 2002 and now has more than 30 shops in 14 cities there.

Likewise, in Japan, trainers branded with the All England Club name and logo sold 350,000 pairs, while Britain, despite being home to less than half the population of Japan, managed to ship only "low four figures" of the same sports shoes. The Japanese are renowned for being image-conscious, but such figures don't add up.

In India, where tennis is growing – in part because of the rising number of competitive Indian tennis players such as Sania Mirza – several firms have secured licenses to create merchandise bearing the All England motif.

Last month, a deal was revealed that will see the Subcontinent produce two different types of moped, one painted in Wimbledon colours (green, silver and purple) and the other in an "exciting red", which is to epitomise the drama of the Championships.

However, while East Asia and the Subcontinent buy into Brand Wimbledon and help fund the Lawn Tennis Association's search for a future British champion – last year the tournament organisers gave £26.3m to the LTA – the Middle East remains a region untapped by the marketing men of the oldest Grand Slam on the tour.

Beryl Kyte, marketing manager at Go Sports Middle East, says no approach was made to stock any special Wimbledon merchandise this year.

"I've not seen any Wimbledon-branded products… The only branded product that we stock is the Slazenger tennis balls that come branded with the Wimbledon logo," she says. "We did a window promotion for the Dubai Tennis Open, but we didn't do one for Wimbledon."

The Dubai Tennis Championships has grown exponentially in recent years in terms of revenue, prize money and publicity. Similarly, the Qatar Open has grown in stature and will host the Women's Tennis Association season finale this year.

When asked about a lack of publicity afforded to the event in a region increasingly more interested in tennis, Johnny Perkins, a spokesman for Wimbledon, says the widespread belief is that it does not make economical sense to plough money into marketing when the event is already internationally recognised.

"It doesn't do a great deal of promotion and that's mainly because it doesn't need to," says Perkins about the 131-year-old Championships. "It's the only Grand Slam that's played on grass and it's already known around the world.

"As far as I know, there are no serious plans in the pipeline to promote the Championships in the Middle East, although obviously that could change."

Wimbledon currently has licensing deals with 26 companies around the world and 15 official companies can use the crossed racquets logo.

Such companies range from Evian water to Blossom Hill wine, but they are hand-picked and kept to a minimum in order to retain the event's "unique image and character", while avoiding the Championships becoming over-commercialised.

Rob McCowen, marketing director for the All England Club, says: "Wimbledon doesn't officially promote itself, but it does have official partners who incorporate the Wimbledon brand into their own merchandise: Ralph Lauren, Fila, Slazenger...

"As well as that there is the event's own official merchandise, which obviously helps promote the event." Adidas, which has several retail outlets in the Emirates, sponsor both men's world No3 Novak Djokovic and women's world No1 Ana Ivanovic – both who played at this year's Dubai Tennis Championships.

The German sports apparel manufacturer also has Russian tennis star Maria Kirilenko signed on as the face of 'adidas by Stella McCartney', a range of tennis-like leisurewear.

Yet a spokesman for the company revealed that while they have these different deals within the tennis industry, they do not produce any branding for Wimbledon, and never have. They do, however, produce clothing embroidered with the motif of Roland Garros, the venue of the annual French Open.

The spokesperson added the company preferred to focus on the Arab world's more popular sports – football, athletics and basketball.

But while football may be the most-watched sport in the Gulf, tennis is becoming an increasingly international game. This year at Wimbledon, in all categories from girls' doubles to men's singles, 69 nationalities took part.

Though none were from the UAE, there were participants from Iran, Israel and Pakistan.

And with the influx of facilities in the UAE, including a David Lloyd Tennis Academy, inevitably the day will come when an Emirati is knocking at the gates of the All England Club.

Whether they will have had to wait until they got to London before they bought their Wimbledon-branded sports shoes, however, we will have to wait and see.