SYDNEY—While it is true that BMW sells thousands of units worldwide every year, making it one of the planet’s bestselling muscles of all time, the company also spends a virtual fortune for its BMW Golf Cup International World Final since the tournament’s inception in 2000.
In fact, so enormous is the money spent by BMW for its signature golf event that if you wonder why it does that religiously, I blame you not.
If you also think that earnings—hard-earned money I must also say—are being unnecessarily tossed out the window every year with every staging of the BMW Golf Cup, I blame you not, either.
Considering the monumental costs that the tournament has annually entailed the past 15 years or so—and continuously at that—would it be really foolish to keep it going?
Consider:
Plane tickets, not just seats I tell you, but business class for each of the 1,000 or so delegates.
Hotel accommodations, not just a hotel I tell you, but five-star.
Golf courses used, not just the walk-in kind I tell you, but membership clubs.
Food. Drinks. Parties. Welcome dinner. Black-tie farewell bash. Live bands. Jazz bands. Dinner on a floating luxury boat. Sailing. Sydney Opera House. Regatta. Climbing the Harbour Bridge. Hugging the koalas. Watching Bondi’s butts. Strolling at Manly’s mini mall. Name it. It’s there.
All expenses on BMW.
You can’t even buy sidewalk hotdogs anymore because you are filled to the brim most times of the day.
Cocktails? Drinks overflow the minute they open the bar.
“It is one thing to sell BMW cars, but to spend a virtual fortune yearly just to sustain a golf tournament such as this is another,” said Karl Magsuci, the marketing mogul of BMW Philippines, who headed the BMW Philippine Golf Team composed of Valley’s Chino Raymundo (a manpower magnate from Pasig), Alabang’s Ruel de Castro (a roofing honcho with exceptional global standards) and Malarayat’s Kaila Gardiola (who owns and co-owns dealerships of both the Peugeot in Lipa and BMW in Alabang, respectively). Also in the delegation were Demosthenes “Bobby” Rosales, Antonio C. Alvarez, Bong Santos and Judy Gardiola, Kaila’s mom.
And it is not only in golf that BMW splurges on its guests, clients and allies but also in other major spheres in sports like yachting and motor sports.
In the last two sports mentioned alone, so much money is spent to keep them humming that the total expenditures shelled out annually for both could probably reduce Janet Lim-Napoles’s alleged P10-billion scam into a mere drop in the bucket. Peanuts. Bird feed.
But having said that, the BMW Golf Cup International would really stand out as its scope and influence on world golf is such that it now ranks as the world’s biggest amateur golf tournament. Thousands alone enter the tournament in more than 50 countries with BMW dealerships, vying for just three, but exceedingly precious slots to make it to the World Cup proper.
Chino, Ruel and Kaila emerged victorious in November at Santa Elena and the trio pooled their talents together to give BMW Philippines a respectable 12th-place finish among 43 nations, with China winning the crown over second-placers Japan and Australia.
And they got their round of applause, the loudest coming from no less than Karl M. “The most profound aspect of your coming here is that you enjoyed every minute of it, not only on the golf courses but, more important, in the other many other events lined up for you by our mother BMW headquarters in Munich,” Karl said to the awesome threesome whose two-day scores pushed them to the top 12 that made it to the third and final round. “The field is tough but your arrival here and your making it to the BMW Golf International proper was already more than an achievement. Congrats guys. You deserve all the applause heaped on you.”
I’ve seen the trio give it their best shot. Determination was written all over their face. They gave justice to the name BMW Philippines.
They made their country proud.
Here’s a glass to you, fellas.
Pee stop. Suddenly, I have become the team captain who was far from where the action is, while the battle plan was being mapped out for Lexus in the March 14 Car Rally in Tagaytay of Ray Butch “Elvis” Gamboa. Even though I was thousands of kilometers away from the whiteboard, Danny “Sir John” Isla, the ever kind-hearted president of Lexus Manila Inc., has not ditched me—relying completely on my unseen skills as a skipper of note (ahem!) while he, as the titular team head, fires last-minute orders on the squad that included Vernon B. Sarne, the Top Gear editor in chief. Still, I am guilt-stricken as I have not totally cascaded down the winning formula for Lexus, which is to fearlessly pursue the art of how not to lose improperly. Cheers!