Abstract
(1) Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has forced non-profit sports clubs to shut their doors. As a consequence, neither sports activities nor social gatherings could take place for an indefinite period. This situation poses potential risks to sports clubs as clubs could lose members, volunteers, and revenue. The purpose of this study is to investigate how strong clubs have been affected so far by COVID-19 and which capacities help or hinder clubs in dealing with the crisis. (2) Methods: The study is based on large-scale primary data (n = 4295) collected among German sports clubs in autumn 2020. Three fractional regression models are applied to examine which organizational capacities are related to potential threats caused by COVID-19. (3) Results: Clubs perceive the risk of losing members as most threatening, followed by the challenge of retaining volunteers. Potential financial threats are perceived as smaller by clubs without their own sports facilities and paid employees. (4) Conclusions: Overall, sports clubs with a strong solidarity culture seem to be affected less by potential threats through COVID-19. To become more resilient to unexpected external influences, capacity building in specific areas of sports clubs should be considered. Support from public institutions and sports associations is needed.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the lives of people and organizations worldwide
With regard to RQ1 and the sports clubs’ subjective evaluation of facing existential threats through the COVID-19 pandemic, clubs see the smallest probability of facing such threats with regard to the financial situation
Clubs rate the probability of existential problems in the area of finances within the twelve months with 17.6%, while facing existential problems in the area of retaining and recruiting volunteers is rated with on average 28.2%
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the lives of people and organizations worldwide. Habits and activities that used to belong to millions of people’s everyday lives were suddenly not possible anymore. The sports sector was hidden hard by the pandemic, both concerning professional and grassroots sports [1] Pertaining to the latter, amateur sports organizations were forced to stop offering activities to their members due to social distancing rules and lockdowns. In their role as membership organizations [2], non-profit sports clubs are characterised by certain constitutive and economic features: Membership in sports clubs is voluntary, and clubs are oriented on the members’ interests. Clubs do not follow profit-maximising goals but rather social and demand-driven goals. Their revenue structure is relatively autonomous, meaning that clubs are mainly financed through revenue by members.
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