Rittenhouse said BMW owners can show their key and enjoy views at the Owners Pavilion on the 17th green BMW
The PGA Tour BMW Championship teed off this morning at Aronimink Golf Club, and BMW Experiential Marketing Manager Tim Rittenhouse has been on the ground since last week helping prep for the third leg of the FedExCup. Rittenhouse, who officially joined BMW back in May '11 from Octagon, caught up with THE DAILY ahead of the players touching down on Tuesday for a quick Q&A on the event's preparation, behind-the-scenes activation and what types of crowds they expect for the weekend.
Q: What's a particular challenge in staging this year's tournament?
Rittenhouse: This is our pinnacle sponsorship in the U.S., and a challenge we have each year is the rotation of the venue, but it's also an opportunity. We get to recreate the footprint every year as we rotate from Chicago to Philly, then we've also been to St. Louis, Denver and Indianapolis in recent years. It also gives us a great opportunity to host customers from across the country in different areas. Last week we entered the final stages of construction for aspects like our brand displays and hospitality areas. We were really just looking to fine tune everything, keep an eye on the weather forecast and make sure we were ready to go when gates opened Tuesday.
Q: How does the previous week's tournament ending on a Monday affect the BMW?
Rittenhouse: It does provide a compressed week for us. We’re losing a day on Monday but fortunately for the players they just had to go from Boston to Philadelphia so it was a quick jump. But we still have a greats sports town here in Philly that we expect to be ready to go in droves.
Q: How/who are you spending your time with as the tournament gets underway?
Rittenhouse: We’ll look after a number of different groups over the course of the week. At the start we had about 15 dealers come in to play in the pro-am. Then over the weekend we’ll host about 40 of our top performing sales managers at our dealer level. They come in to attend the tournament and then play the course on Monday after the final round. They’ve earned a trip to come spend some time with us. Then there's our customers -- last year we hosted around 10,000 over the course of the week, and that’s really the focus for us. How can we present an event that gives our owners a unique access to the PGA Tour? That’s partly through our Owners Pavilion on the 17th green where they can show their BMW key and enjoy some of the best views on the course.
Q: Will you get to tee it up on Monday as well?
Rittenhouse: Historically, I have played with them but this year I’m not quite sure what the cards entail, but golf is the number one sporting activity for many of our customers so anytime we can get out there and swing alongside them we’re excited.
