RBC Canadian OpenChris McGrath
As RBC pumps more money into golf, the field for the Canadian Open keeps getting better.
The bank announced Thursday that it has reached sponsorship agreements with Matt Kuchar, Jim Furyk and Ernie Els - the top three finishers on the 2010 PGA Tour money list - which will virtually guarantee each takes part in the RBC Canadian Open at Vancouver's Shaughnessy Golf and Country Club in July.
"It's one of the things you have to do," Jim Little, RBC's chief brand and communications officer, said in an interview. "We've got to have a good field and we've got a challenging date. We've got to really work hard to make sure the tournament's good. We're very proud of the progress we've made on it.
"Unless something strange happens, they're going to be participants at Shaughnessy and we're going to have a great field there."
The individual partnerships run much deeper than that. Furyk and Kuchar will now carry RBC tour bags at tournaments - similar to those currently used by Anthony Kim and Mike Weir of Bright's Grove, Ont. - and all three players will wear the company's logo somewhere on their clothing.
Els, Furyk and Kuchar join Kim, Weir, Calgary's Stephen Ames, Luke Donald, Fred Couples and women's star Morgan Pressel in RBC's growing stable of players.
As part of their sponsorship agreements, each player makes appearances on behalf of the bank.
"We've had people in the business who were kind of neutral on what golf could do to help them grow the business," said Little. "And then they saw Luke Donald the day after the Ryder Cup at Wentworth (in London) and they saw Stephen Ames go down to Trinidad. It's the actual presence of these guys in front of our clients in points around the world that makes it real for them.
"The demand from within the company keeps growing every year," added Little.
RBC has been committed to golf since it took over title sponsorship of the Canadian Open in November 2007.
At that time, it had no other ties to the sport. Now it funds Golf Canada's high-performance amateur team and the country's national amateur championship, and has created a program to help young Canadian pros - in addition to its player endorsements and significant financial commitment to the only PGA Tour event held in Canada.