Toky-owe

Several colleges have been left thousands of pounds out of pocket because of unpaid sponsorship money from Tokyo nightclub, with YUSU President Kallum Taylor hinting that Tokyo’s official club night status is not necessarily safe for next year.

Vanbrugh claim to be owed around £4000 by the popular nightspot, whilst Halifax say they are around £3000 down and Derwent claim they are £1000 in the red.

Alcuin Chair Joshua Lee, meanwhile, says that his college has been “significantly overcharged” and that they are awaiting a refund, whilst Langwith have had issues regarding sports kit sponsorship and are reluctant to work with Tokyo again in the future.

The shortage in cash comes at a particularly difficult time for the colleges as they begin to plan next year’s Freshers’ Week – the biggest week in the academic calendar for every JCRC.

There are now fears amongst some of the colleges that planning could be significantly affected if the money is not paid in soon. However, the issue has now been dragging on since the autumn term, and Tokyo claim that Halifax are in fact the only college to whom any money is owed at all.

Should the colleges not receive the money Tokyo allegedly owe then the quality and low cost of their respective Freshers’ Weeks could be in serious jeopardy. Colleges rely on Freshers’ Week to give students a sense of belonging and to provide them with the best possible start to their university lives, and sub-par events or high ticket costs could lead to immediate disillusionment and widespread criticism.

All seven of York’s undergraduate colleges have had sponsorship agreements with Tokyo this year and in the past. The agreements involve the colleges putting on events such as bar crawls which advertise Tokyo as the endpoint or on-campus events with Tokyo wristbands, all in return for sponsorship money.

However, it now appears that several colleges have been left in the lurch. Vanbrugh Chair Joshua Treacy spoke of how he felt hurt by Tokyo’s failure to respect their agreement: “Vanbrugh takes great pride in being able to offer our students the best possible value for the events and services we provide. Our Freshers’ Week ticket was the best value in the University and we massively subsidised our Winter Ball. This is only possible through sponsorship. Yet now that Tokyo has failed to respect their agreement, we are suddenly in debt,” he told Vision.

“We are currently struggling to operate as the college we should be. This is particularly hurtful after having organised several bar crawls to the club and having put their logo on all of our brand new merchandise.”

Despite Treacy’s claims, Tokyo insist that Vanbrugh are not owed any money, and club manager Adele Lord even went so far as to say that she does not understand how they could even possibly be owed as much as £4000: “None of the colleges apart from Halifax actually fulfilled the contract. We had something with Derwent – they didn’t do it at all which they were well aware of, and I’m sure Vanbrugh haven’t either.

“We wouldn’t even sponsor anybody that much for the year so I don’t know where that amount of money’s come from,” she said.

However, Treacy cleared up this issue, saying: “£4000 is for £1000 each term this year plus extra sponsorship agreements during freshers.”

Like Vanbrugh, Derwent College Chair Anmoli Sodha feels certain that her college has fulfilled all their commitments to Tokyo: “They owe us £1000 for sponsorship commitments we completed last term,” she told Vision.

“I know we completed ours last term. We didn’t autumn term, which is exactly why I made sure we did when I took over.

“We have had a few meetings with them on campus and we bring up the money issue, and they say it will be dealt with and sent to us soon, it just never turns up.”

Even Halifax, to whom Tokyo have admitted they owe money, are being frustrated by the lack of payment. Halifax President Marian Lally said: “It’s around the £3000 mark too and the agreement is we send a set number of bar crawls their way per term. It would be great to get this finally sorted, especially with freshers on the horizon.”

She continued that Halifax had spoken to the nightclub “maybe about 6 or 7 times over the past few months, it’s been dragging on since Christmas time really.”

Langwith College had what they can perhaps call a lucky escape with Tokyo earlier this year, as a verbal agreement that College Chair Sam Maguire said they had in place fell through.

He spoke to Vision criticising Tokyo for their poor communication: “We did verbally agree some sponsorship deals with Tokyo. However, they never followed them up and didn’t respond to our calls so we have just looked elsewhere for investment,” he said.

Tokyo manager Adele Lord laughed off these claims, telling Vision: “That was quite hysterical really. Two guys got in touch with my promotions manager about sponsoring a Langwith hockey kit. I told them I’d speak to my business director about sponsoring the kit and see what he wants to do.

“I came back to them the week after and I said to them because there’s so many college teams that we didn’t want to be biased and specifically pick Langwith hockey. There’s so many of them and we didn’t really see that as fair.
“There was never a deal set up,” she added.

Maguire contradicted these claims, discussing the possibility of boycotting Tokyo for any future deal: “We had a few deals for sponsorship for sports kits and our mascot. They didn’t communicate well with us at all and we are reluctant to have much involvement with them in the future bar bringing people to the club if we run an event on a Thursday,” he said.

YUSU President Kallum Taylor has come out in support of the JCRCs, stressing the importance of every penny towards putting on events and providing the best for their students: “JCRCs depend on pretty much all of their income, and nothing goes to waste in putting on events and services for their students, so it’s vital that any deals that were made are properly adhered to.
“We’ll be seeking input from a lot of sources, particularly JCRCs, when it comes to picking the YUSU Student Nights for next year, and we’ll be taking up this particular issue with Tokyo ASAP.”