Sponsor backdrop for interviews and photos – which one to choose

Types of backdrop – pros and cons

Banner wall (tube and connector frame) – a frame of tubes with a banner fitted via pole pockets or eyelets.

• Pros: the cheapest, the graphic can be replaced for little money, one person can assemble it.
• Cons: under strong lighting a banner can show a slight sheen, and poor tensioning shows creases.

Fabric pop-up wall (straight or curved) – a folding scissor-type frame with stretched fabric.

• Pros: matt fabric with no reflections from lamps and flashes, a crease-free graphic, it sets up in minutes, and the fabric can be folded without worrying about creases.
• Cons: higher upfront cost, and it takes a little practice the first time.

Fabric press backdrop – a taller wall (2.5 m) with fabric, used at press conferences and galas.

• Pros: the edge of the wall stays out of shot even with a tall speaker, and it looks professional on TV.
• Cons: the most expensive of the three and takes up more space in transport.

For a club that does interviews after every match in the same spot, we usually recommend a straight fabric wall. For occasional events a banner wall is perfectly adequate.

Sponsor backdrop prices

The 'graphic only' column matters when sponsors change every season. The frame stays, and a new print costs roughly half the complete set. So we encourage planning the backdrop as an investment for several years, with the graphic as the part that changes. Model details are on the fabric display and media walls and hop-up walls pages.

How to lay out logos so they stay in shot

This is the most common mistake: a beautiful design with one large club logo in the middle and sponsors scattered at the sides. Then the coach stands in front of the camera, covers the middle, and the shot shows half a logo and empty space.

An interview backdrop works differently from a poster. The camera usually frames the speaker from the waist up – the shot takes in approx. 1.2–1.5 m of the wall's width. Hence the rules:

1. A repeating grid – logos in rows, offset every other row (a step-and-repeat or chequerboard). The gap between repeats of the same logo approx. 40–60 cm.
2. The key logos at head and shoulder height – i.e. approx. 140–190 cm from the floor. The lower part of the wall is rarely in shot.
3. Club logo and title sponsor alternating – so that every shot includes at least one of them.
4. A plain background – white or in the club colour, no photos or gradients. A photo background merges with the speaker.
5. Logos as vectors – on a 3 m wall every logo is enlarged many times over.

If you would rather not lay it out yourself, our studio designs it: a simple layout is approx. €43 net, and for more complex designs studio time is approx. €35 net per hour.

Lighting, positioning and details that make a difference

Set the backdrop up not against the wall but approx. 1–1.5 m in front of it, and the speaker approx. 1–2 m in front of the backdrop. That keeps the speaker's shadow from the camera light off the background, and the logos stay sharp.

A few things you only learn in practice:

• In a hall with strong lighting, choose fabric or matt banner. Glossy material produces white hotspots on the footage.
• A logo carpet in front of the backdrop looks good – in whole-team photos the floor is visible. We make printed carpets to order.
• For local media filming on a phone, it is worth adding a roller banner with the title sponsor's logo alongside. A 100 × 200 cm roller banner is from approx. €65 net.
• After the match the backdrop folds into its bag – store it somewhere dry, not in a car in freezing weather.

How to look after backdrops and roller banners between events is covered in our guide how to store and transport a roller banner and display wall.

The backdrop as part of your sponsorship offer

For a club, a sponsor backdrop is one of the stronger arguments in a conversation with a sponsor. Interviews reach local media and social channels, and photos from every press conference stay online for years. The sponsor sees their logo next to the coach and players – something a fence banner cannot deliver.

So describe it specifically in your sponsorship offer: where the backdrop stands, on which occasions it is used, how many interviews take place in a season. Ideas for the whole sponsor offer are collected in our guide how a club can earn from sponsors, and ready-made sponsor zone solutions are on the sponsor zones and fan zones page.