Sadeke Brooks, Gleaner Writer

Baby Tash adjusts her crown as the 2008 Magnum Queen of The Dancehall at Weekenz, Constant Spring Road, on Saturday, April 19. - Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer

Talent is showcased and Jamaican culture develops through talent searches, but sponsors also get the opportunity to gain more brand recognition through their association with the events.

Among the many annual talent shows in Jamaica are Tastee Talent Trail, Digicel Rising Stars, Dancing Dynamites and Magnum Kings and Queens of Dancehall, the newest of them all.

The 27-year-old Tastee Talent Trail (formerly Tastee Talent Contest) gives Jamaicans the opportunity to show their abilities in dance, music, drama and poetry. Marketing manager of Tastee Limited, Sharon Bailey, said the company started the contest to help develop talent in Jamaica.

"We developed that event. It is what we give back to Jamaica. We don't do it to get back anything, because it is not a profitable thing. For us it is more goodwill. We believe in the development of young people," she said.

The competition has helped unearth popular entertainers such as Nadine Sutherland, King Yellowman, Beenie Man, TOK, Paul Blake, Mr Vegas and Cobra.

Bailey said Tastee Limited also awards scholarships and sponsors the Festival celebrations and Popular Song Competition, another way of helping to develop the creative arts.

most successful

The most successful of all the talent searches might be Digicel Rising Stars, based on the viewership and number of votes contestants receive each week.

Marketing manager of Digicel Limited, Tahnida Nunes, said the company gains "brand awareness, brand affinity and brand loyalty".

She said the company also gets the opportunity to be a proud sponsor of culture in Jamaica, primarily sports and music.

"When Rising Stars was brought to us we were looking for something of that nature to catapult the brand to a next level," Nunes told The Sunday Gleaner.

She explained that there were talents shows of that nature elsewhere, including Pop Idol in Ireland and American Idol in the United States. Hence Digicel wanted to bring that type of top-class entertainment to Jamaica because it is big business.

"It is definitely big business, because almost everybody in Jamaica wants to be an entertainer. Even with a nine-to-five they have some talent they would like to unearth," she said.

The company has benefited from the five-year-old show, which has grown over the years. "The show has been nothing short of a phenomenon. When we compare the tapes from 2005 to now, we see that the show has grown tremendously," Nunes said.

While it was hard to put a dollar-figure on the cost of the show, Nunes says this season costs more than US $1 million. However, "it is more than impossible to put a dollar figure on the amount of airtime TVJ gives to us and the messages that we send (on the Digicel network)".

Like Digicel, Noel Esty, s marketing manger, said it is difficult to give the average cost of sponsoring a talent show. Nonetheless, he said the company gets "brand recognition, staff-morale boost, community acceptance, sales opportunities and advertising opportunities".

increase sales

Although MiPhone has stopped sponsoring Dancing Dynamites because of the ownership change, it has gained otherwise. When Miphone sponsored the show in 2006 and 2007, Esty said it helped to develop youth and dance, reinforce the MiPhone brand and increase sales.

Esty said the company would sponsor another talent show in the future if the conditions are suitable. However, it continues to sponsor others events in the creative arts and for fund-raising purposes.

Gary Dixon, Magnum brand manager, said Kings and Queens of the Dancehall was chosen because dancehall, which is part of popular culture, has always supported Magnum. He said the contestants were not allowed to use derogatory lyrics or those that incite violence. Hence, there is positive association between the brand and the competition.

"It gives us mass appeal and at the end of the day it translates into revenues and people will see us as good corporate citizens," he told The Sunday Gleaner.

He added: "It's a huge investment for us, but it is well worth it. It translates into sales, a positive image for the brand and it's a way of giving back to a popular culture that has helped us to grow over the years."