Switzerland – the home of fine chocolate, great skiing, annoying cuckoo clocks and an army forced to defend itself with tiny pen knives.

Switzerland – the home of fine chocolate, great skiing, annoying cuckoo clocks and an army forced to defend itself with tiny pen knives. It is also the home of Scottish-born lawyer Patrick Stewart. The former Burness trainee now works for the Lucerne-based marketing agency TEAM, which
in turn sees him handling many legal issues for the UEFA Champions League. It’s an exciting life and one that makes Gordon Laing green with envy.

Outside the weather’s cold but the Corinthian’s Light Bar is warm – busy with lunchtime stragglers unwilling to return to their office desks.
Patrick Stewart – a native of these Scottish shores, but now living in Switzerland – has just arrived. Suitcase in hand, he is in Glasgow to address a delegate of business professionals later this evening.
It is at this juncture that it may be best to add that, for many lawyers that are also fans of football, he might just have one of the best legal jobs going.
Now, Switzerland may not be as famous for its football as it is for its watches, chocolate, banks, or even its prices. However, as it happens, it is the home of football, literally, with UEFA and FIFA both choosing to base their headquarters in the country.
Stewart is legal council for Lucerne-based elite sports marketing agency TEAM. And TEAM’s main project is with the UEFA Champions League – for which it has been the football body\'s marketing agency since the League’s inception in 1992.
A graduate of law, Stewart completed his traineeship at Burness, where he practiced for a year in corporate. Keen to get involved in IP he snapped up an opportunity to join Maclay Murray & Spens, where he worked with Alistair Orr for three years, dealing with various clients, including Hibernian Football Club.
Having gained a taste for it, he decided he wanted to get more involved in football related matters, and Stewart was interviewed for a job at a company called ISL – which, at the time, worked heavily with FIFA for the World Cup.
“I was offered a job in Switzerland by ISL,” recounts Stewart. “But just before I signed a contract with them they went bust – spectacularly. Fortunately for me, it wasn’t the crushing blow that it could have been, because I hadn’t, at that point, handed my notice in. But it was a huge disappointment as they had the commercial rights for the World Cup.”
But, less than a year later, the opportunity came to join TEAM: “They knew that I had almost joined ISL, so they already knew that I was prepared to buy into the idea of moving to Switzerland,” continues Stewart.
And that is where he remains today. Most of the time, at least.
“I spend about 80 per cent of my time in Lucerne, and 20 per cent of the time is spent travelling,” said Stewart. “I have been going to Norway every month this year, as a venue manager, to ensure that all the specifications were being met at Rosenborg’s ground. Working at TEAM we are expected to get out of the office and get our hands dirty.
“Everyone in the company basically has two jobs. You have an office job and you have your venue job. I travel quite extensively to the venues, but also to TV and sponsors’ HQs in London, Paris and Brussels. So, there is a lot of travel involved in my role, but I don’t think that I’ve got blasé about it just yet. I still actually quite enjoy it.”
TEAM advises on all commercial aspects of the League, from how many sponsors the tournament should have, to how many broadcasters UEFA should sell the rights to in each country.
The agency’s role – at the centre of a triangle that consists of clubs, sponsors and broadcasters – also involves making sure that all parties concerned understand what is involved when they are participating in the Champions League – making sure that everything works and that everyone’s rights are delivered.
TEAM works with UEFA to come up with the marketing concept. As a lawyer Stewart will attend a number of the presentations. As legal council he is asked for advice from the start, right the way through, to the conclusion of the deal.
“We’re a small company – 80 people – so we work closely together. We know, most of the time, what page the other guy is on – particularly as an in-house advisor, you know the business so well.
“UEFA have marketing teams in-house,” continues Stewart, “but the Champions League is so massive now they prefer to have an agency to coordinate the deals. It’s very much a partnership. We take proposals to them and we discuss them. The most dramatic change, from a sponsorship perspective, was six years ago when we moved from eight sponsors to four sponsors. TEAM pushed for that. We believed that UEFA could make more money from a four-way deal. A more selective partnership with sponsors, and that’s worked.”
Stewart, one of four lawyers at the company (including the deputy CEO) was the TEAM lawyer responsible for the current three-year sponsorship deals with Ford, Amstel, MasterCard, and Playstation2.
TEAM was founded 12 years ago, with the purpose of starting the Champions League. The competition started as an eight-team tournament. It’s now grown into one of the most prestigious club tournaments in the world, with 32 teams and millions of pounds worth of revenues. But, with so much at stake, the conditions for involvement need to be understood and observed.
“When we go to a venue we make sure that the broadcasters have the camera positions that have been agreed. We have to negotiate with the clubs to get the right camera angles – even if 1,000 seats will be lost, as it’s a trade-off.
My ground this year – Rosenborg – is a good example of a stadium that’s been built with the Champions League camera requirements in mind. Chelsea, for example, don’t have enough space outside the stadium for all the television vehicles and equipment, so what they’ve had to do on some occasions is close off something like 5,000 seats – an entire section of the terracing – to provide the necessary space for all the TV facilities.
“But a lot of negotiation goes on with the clubs. We don’t storm in and make hundreds of unreasonable demands. There needs to be a bit of give and take.
“At the end of the day there are some guidelines that need to be adhered to. But there has been some give and take – in the early days of the Champions League there weren’t even shirt sponsorships allowed.
“Control is not what the Champions League is about. It is about creating a mutual benefit and to make that work there have to be some rules. There are certain principles that partners follow. But if these principles weren’t reasonable, then people would not sign up to them.”
According to Stewart, businesses are much more IP aware now: “The main asset of many a business is, in one way or another, intellectual property. People are much more aware of the need to protect their main assets. When people are starting in business IP is something that they are now quick to consider. Previously it was a costly mistake that many made.
“When we do deals on behalf of UEFA with, for example, a music supplier we will always make sure that the IP is owned by UEFA. That is not always the norm, but it’s UEFA standard policy. They make sure that they get the IP in-house, and they own it. Monitoring the IP is pretty strong as well.”
Finishing his drink – a mineral water – as Stewart readies himself to leave, to go and prepare for the evening’s presentation, he mulls over a return to Scotland: “I have a Scottish wife, and a Scottish family. But Switzerland has a great standard of living. You are in the middle of Europe, and the rest of Europe is on your doorstep. We got on the train to Florence for a long weekend, last weekend. My job is enjoyable yet challenging, the country we live in is beautiful and there are great opportunities. One day I’ll return, but just now I’m just enjoying myself.”