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Major sport events are facing increasing demands. These events are no longer “just” about sport, but are now expected to be sustainable, multicultural, democratic and convey specific political values such as “unity,” “identity” and “peace.” The increasing demands on major sport events place local hosts in a difficult situation, accommodating both the organization of the sport competitions and the ideologies connected to these events. The purpose of this paper is to identify motives for engagement among stakeholders of the 2017 Barents Summer Games. Furthermore, it investigates how and in what ways these motives are conflicting, and what the consequences of conflicting motives of engagement can be for the development of innovation in major sport events.

The empirical data in this study are derived from one year of ethnographic fieldwork, focusing on participant observations of the planning and execution of the 2017 Barents Summer Games.

The analysis identifies key economic, socio-cultural, political and athletic motives for engagement among six different stakeholders involved in the games. Additionally, the results indicate how there are both conflicting economic, socio-cultural and political motives for engagement among the stakeholders. Finally, the analysis illustrates how conflicting motives for engagement constitutes an innovation barrier for major sport events.

The study is based on ethnographic fieldwork of the planning and execution of the 2017 Barents Summer Games, a major sport event in the Barents region. The Barents region is characterized by its unique nature and vulnerable environment, with wide tundra areas in the north and extensive boreal forests zones in the south. The region represents an area as large as Poland, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, France (mainland) and Spain (mainland) together, totaling 1.75m km². Several indigenous peoples and minority groups live in the region, such as the Sami and the Komi. Hence, the context of the study is quite unique and the results may not be transferable to other major sport events with regional significance.

Previous research on motives in major sport events have focused on motives and motivation for engagement among volunteers in major sport events. The paper contributes to this research field by studying motives of engagement among stakeholders from private, public and volunteer sectors in a major international sport event with regional significance.

The paper aims to (1) explore the positive and negative sociocultural, economic, and environmental impacts on satisfaction, and behavioral intentions; and (2) examine the changes in relationships among event impacts, satisfaction and behavioral intentions of host city residents before and after a major sporting event.

We used panel data to estimate how resident responses change over time. The data were collected three months before (N before = 266) and three months after (N after = 266) the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games. Data were analyzed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), structural equation modeling (SEM) and invariance tests.

A significant relationship exists between negative and positive perceived sociocultural, economic, and environmental impacts, satisfaction and behavioral intentions. In addition, findings suggest that the effect of the sociocultural impacts on satisfaction and of satisfaction on behavioral intentions strengthened after the event. The relationship between positive environmental impacts and satisfaction was reduced across the two points in time. Our results indicate that residents’ assessment regarding the sporting event partially changed over the whole six-month course of the study.

This study differs from most recent research in that it examines the sociocultural, economic, and environmental event impacts in modeling residents’ satisfaction and testing the influence of negative event impacts on residents’ satisfaction and behavioral intentions. The current study contributes to the literature by emphasizing the changes that occur regarding the relationships among event impacts, satisfaction and behavioral intentions across the same respondents over time.

Major sports events have the potential to offer significant benefits to any city, but at the same time are likely to entail immense resource utilisation and enormous risk. Focussed at the organising committee level, and drawing upon general management and project management literature, aims to collect empirical data to identify current management practice used in the bidding process, and determine key factors in successful bidding. A self‐administered postal questionnaire was sent to 220 randomly selected major sports event organisers from ten different countries. Targeted at the chief executive officer level or equivalent, the questionnaire provided general contextual detail and focussed on present sports event management practices and processes. To gain more in‐depth understanding of successful applications, three semi‐structured interviews were administered in England. The findings reveal that the primary motivations behind local authority involvement are heightening area profile and sport promotion. Successful public sector applications were found to use bounded rational decision‐making, driven largely by political reasoning rather than detailed objective analysis. Specifically identifies and discusses five key factors behind successful national and international governing body approval.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the social impact of major sports events perceived by host city residents using Shanghai as an example.

Exploratory factor analysis based on 450 valid questionnaires.

Research revealed six impact factors including four positive ones: “image and status,” “international exchange and cooperation,” “economic and tourism development,” and “infrastructure development.” In addition, two negative ones are also identified as “inconvenience of life” and “environment pollution and security concern.” Taken as a whole, the local residents in Shanghai have a relative positive perception of the impact of major sports events. Four out of six impact factors were significantly predictive of the attitude toward future bidding of major sports events.

The existing literature mainly examined social impact of specific events through case study, and little is known about the overall perception of major sports events in general. Accordingly, this paper seeks to bridge the gap by taking an event portfolio approach using Shanghai as an example.

Existing literature reports the positive image impact of major sports events on sport tourists. This paper empirically tests the image impact of an overall sports events initiative on a host city, and on intention to revisit from the perspective of general international tourists. The findings show that major sports events, in general, can be useful in reaching out to tourists. However, it questions the utilisation of sports events in destination marketing to general tourists - as awareness of sports events actually depresses tourism atmosphere and service image, as well as the overall destination image. Practical implications and future research are suggested.

This research conceptualises the hallmark event, Melbourne Cup in Australia, as a major sporting brand experience. While numerous studies have explored consumer engagement and experiences in major sporting events, few research studies highlight the negative issues, such as alcoholism, gambling and violence, that may affect consumer engagement and experience. This article addresses the challenges and opportunities of providing immersive and transformative experiences through transformative service research (TSR) approaches when such negative issues are swirling around.

The paper is conceptual. It uses the example of Melbourne Cup to illuminate aspects of the conceptual framework.

The article unpacks a myriad of positive and negative immersive brand experiences and contributes a conceptual framework to understand the sporting brand experience phenomenon and shows how authentically responsible marketing approaches can improve the sport spectator experience.

Insights from the extended TSR framework presents implications for various organisations that are involved with strategic destination marketing approaches. It guides key stakeholders to engage in dialogue and collaborate in order to improve the attendee transformative experience. Inviting collaborators will facilitate the exchange of ideas that will improve event organisation. Consistent approaches among hospitality service providers would improve alcohol service and create a safe environment for attendees. The TSR framework guides players of the experience to engage in meaningful dialogue with a common goal to improve consumer wellbeing. Education and training therefore are key elements in the consumer sporting brand experience.

The adapted TSR framework offers insights to destination marketers such as sporting agencies, tour operators and sporting organisations/clubs. Marketers may promote bigger sporting events and organise tours via travel agencies and ignore key elements that may influence attendee decision. Destination marketing organisations (DMOs) can use the framework to promote effective planning and the key initiatives that the iconic event is involved with. The framework can be used as a guide to manage similar international events. Events of major or mega size and international reputation need specific frameworks that address crowd behaviours of similar sizes.

An extended transformative service approach is being conceptualised for major sporting brand experiences. Practical implications are also highlighted for DMOs when raising the profile of city brands.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of how the city of Dubai branded itself as a major event holder for sustainable sporting events in the Gulf Region.

The paper uses both academic and trade literature as well as key informant interviews to demonstrate how Dubai can sustain its position as a choice for sustainable sporting events. The study evaluates the use of a portfolio of major sport events for place event marketing of Dubai. Both primary and secondary data were used. The secondary data was collected from a range of event reports, media and journal articles. The primary data featured a qualitative design of key informant interviews with sport, tourism and event stakeholders in Dubai.

Dubai hosts a wide array of major international sport events, with many of them recurring annually. The key success factors that have positioned Dubai as a globally competitive sport destination are tourism attractiveness, good event management and the diversity of events hosted in the region. However, the sustainability aspects are considered to be a contemporary topic to promote these events and are sometimes neglected from the perspective of event organisation. Some of the challenges experienced in supporting such a wide portfolio of major sport events are examined.

Insufficient key informant interviews were a major limitation for the data collection process. The key informant interviews were sent out to more than 30 key stakeholders however it was not possible to get their responses in time for our paper. A second limitation was the lack of first-hand observation on the sporting events’ sustainability practices. This study could be extended in future by incorporating a bigger set of primary data, event observations and a cross comparison between other Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

It is recommended that empirical insights on social and commercial aspects of sustainability are sought in future studies. It is also recommended that investigations be conducted with the residents of Dubai concerning their perceptions of sustainability practices of sport events.

The paper also highlighted the importance of key success factors that have helped to position Dubai as a globally competitive sustainable sport destination as well as some of the challenges experienced in supporting such a wide portfolio of major sport events.

This study takes a closer look at the challenges of communication as well as the sustainability of sport events in branding of Dubai.

Singapore hosted the inaugural Youth Olympic Games (YOG) in 2010. Prior studies have shown that a country hosting a major sports event can raise the level of national pride among its citizens. The purpose of this paper is to examine the change in national pride among spectators and non-spectators following the hosting of the YOG.

A longitudinal research design was employed in this study. Surveys using the General National Pride Scale to measure the level of national pride were conducted two months before and after the YOG.

Using paired t-tests, the results showed that there was a significant increase in the level of national pride among non-spectators.

The research concurs with earlier research that hosting a major sports event can increase the level of national pride in the population.

From an application standpoint, this research suggests that in planning major sports events, the government should recognise that such events can increase the level of national pride even among those who have expressed no interest in the sports events.

National pride can be fostered through the hosting of major sports events.

This study demonstrates that in hosting a major sports event, there is an increase in national pride even among non-spectators and those who have no interest in the event.

In a major multi-sport event, the athlete is both a benefactor and producer of organizational activities. Athletes’ centrality makes understanding their satisfaction with the event an important management activity. The purpose of this paper is to examine the lived athletes experience (during the event), so as to provide insight into the important Games facets contributing to their satisfaction and to explore the controllable aspects of the event from an organizer’s perspective that athletes felt made the Games special and memorable.

A multi-dimensional instrument (i.e. Athlete Experience Questionnaire) was designed and tested at previous iterations of a major multi-sport event and was employed during Games-time. In total, 813 athletes completed the questionnaire during the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

The findings demonstrated an overall high level of satisfaction with the event. Several important facets contributed to athlete satisfaction including social-, service- and communication-related aspects. Further, athletes reported on the importance of cultural opportunities within their Games experience.

The paper denotes the importance of the social and cultural interactions and opportunities which lie outside the athletes’ actual competition experience and increase their specialness of the event. Theoretical and practical implications are drawn from the findings relative to the service-dominant logic and service-quality literature within a major multi-sport event Games for the athlete stakeholder.

This paper explores how athletes experience the major international multi-sport event environment. Moreover, this paper offers a significant contribution from a hard-to-reach population (i.e. elite-level international athletes), adopts their perspective of the Games environment and determines what contributes to their satisfaction. As the authors highlight, the paper denotes the importance of the planned social and cultural interactions and opportunities, which lie outside the athlete’s actual competition event experience, to increase athlete satisfaction; in contrast, basic sport competition needs seem to be a “basic” expectation.