MSc Marketing Management students have been working with Aberdeen Football Club (AFC) as part of Industry Week, a project that connects students with local businesses to gain valuable skills and experience.
34 students visited Pittodrie Stadium to meet with key figures from the club and the AFC Community Trust (AFCCT) and learn about their plans for the future.
Rob Wicks, AFC Commercial Director, challenged them to come up with ideas that would help the club reach a wider audience and generate more interest in its planned move to a new £50m, 20,000-seater stadium at Kingsford.
Working with experts from the Business School, Elevator, and Aberdeen-based social enterprise Scarf, six teams of students ended the week with a presentation on campus to a panel of experts, including representatives from the club and community trust.
AFC’s Commercial Director, Rob Wicks, said: “We are very grateful to the Business School for providing AFC and our partner charity with this opportunity and also to the students for engaging with the tasks so positively.
“The standard of presentation was excellent and they have certainly given us some ideas that we can action over the coming weeks, months and years. It has been great to get a fresh take on some of the challenges that we face as a football club and it is something that we would love to participate in again next year.
“We are working in partnership with the University of Aberdeen across a number of areas and this is just a further example of the mutual benefits that come as part of that.”
Dr Elizabeth Thomson, MSc Marketing Management Programme Leader, added: “Working with AFC and AFCCT has given the students a hugely valuable opportunity to put theory into practice and to showcase their talents.
“The students really enjoyed the week and embraced the challenge of producing high quality work in a short timescale.
“We would like to thank the team at AFC for developing such varied and interesting briefs and for hosting us at Pittodrie. We hope to build on the strong partnership we have developed with AFC to provide students with industry experience within their local community.”