Originally Posted by
DLBroox
All the revenue from TV goes directly to the Tour promoters. Sponsors make almost no money directly from owning a team. Most have teams as a hobby. That's from an article I read just this morning.
Nobody should get into the business of owning a sports team and hope to make money.
As for if the sponsorship is worth it, for the price of running the team, a sponsor like Garmin, Trek, FDJ, Saxo bank or whoever, gets their logo on French, Spanish, Italian tv all day instead of just 30 second spots, each of which might cost the price of a team bike or more. Then they get themselves on the cover of L'Equipe, La Gazzetta Dello Sport, various cycling magazines on newsstands all over Europe etc, and maybe now and again a bit of mainstream coverage (Le Monde, NY Times, CNN, etc).