25 Mar 2014

Big profit for NZ Rugby

3:16 pm on 25 March 2014

New Zealand Rugby has announced a profit of $2.9 million for 2013.

The result is slightly down on the 2012 profit of $3.2 million which was the first profit for New Zealand Rugby since 2008, but well ahead of their budgeted profit of $790,000.

The 2013 profit reflected a $10 million lift in income to $117 million and an increase in costs by $11 million to $114 million.

New Zealand Rugby chief executive Steve Tew says he's particularly pleased that all 14 provincial ITM Cup unions are now in surplus.

The unions reported profits for 2013 with a combined surplus of $3.3 million - a big turnaround from a small surplus of $620,000 last year and a deficit in 2011 of $630,000.

Part of that surplus came from the national body releasing a funding increase of $7.7 million back to the provinces over a three-year period, which is on top of the $19 million unions had been receiving each year from New Zealand Rugby.

But Tew says the unions themselves are running much tighter operations now.

He says 2013 was also the first full year with their new major global sponsor AIG, building on the platform they'd established with long-standing principal partner Adidas.

The Japan Test en route to last year's end of year tour to Europe also brought in around $850,000 in profit for New Zealand Rugby, which also announced an increase in its cash reserves to $63.7 million.