15 of December, 2008
2009 Gun & Product Clarification

The Millennium Series has a fine line to walk between the needs of the sponsors and those of the players in order to raise the necessary funding to produce a series of high level professional events at as reasonable a cost to the player as possible. At the same time The Millennium makes massive efforts behind the scenes trying to raise the profile of the series and teams in order to attract funding for all from new outside industry sources. The results of this work will now hopefully start bearing fruit during the course of 2009 with benefits for all.

The primary goal of The Millennium Series has been to market the sport to a wider audience in order to ensure new players are attracted to play paintball, (not necessarily our series), at every level ensuring the good health of the industry.

The Series only exists in its current form due to industry sponsors. Without them either the level of professionalism would be considerably lower than today, therefore not being attractive to a wider audience, or entry fees would be so high that all but a very few rich teams could afford it. Either way without this there would be no series fit for purpose.

Many of our sponsors have supported us for several years, and as a result have supported the teams that play the Millennium. There are also many companies that have not supported us, and of course they have the right not to, but use the Millennium very successfully to market their products. Whether this is fair or not is a matter opinion, but we think what is clearly not fair is the few paying for the many.
We also have to bear in mind current economics and try to widen the source of funding in order to maintain the necessary level of professionalism required if we want to achieve our goals.

Certain statements have been made on various forums that are blatantly not true or only tell part of the story. Due to client confidentiality we cannot enter the fray each time something is written but we would like to make the following clarifications that should give you a good idea of when certain claims are at best being exaggerated.

For 2009 we are asking gun manufacturers, (who enjoy the most direct marketing benefits of the Millennium), to support the Millennium at a minimum level of a Gun Display Sponsor. The cost for this is €10,000 for the entire series, not the €60,000.00 that has been claimed in some forums. To ensure there is a benefit for all new and existing sponsors we will also protect them in so far as ensuring only guns from a sponsor can be used in the locked divisions, those benefiting the most from TV coverage. It was always our intention not to impose this on Division three and after further discussion we have also decided to extend this to Division 2 teams. We feel this is a fundamentally fair position for all. We have had discussions with all major manufacturers both old and new and at no point did anybody have a major negative reaction to this. In fact at the meetings held in Paris & Orlando, everybody left us with the firm impression that they were on board. There are some other manufacturers that we are currently talking with to try to ensure no major gaps occur for the players. We also know of certain manufacturers who intend to assist any teams who may have issues here through a variety of assistance programs.

There are manufacturers in paintball that heavily invest in furthering our sport and support teams widely. Without these people there would be no real competitive paintball anywhere in the world. They deserve our support and the support of the industry.

There are other statements being made relating to other products, hoppers, packs etc. It is not the plan of the Millennium to impose any restrictions on players regarding any other product except for Paintballs which has been the case for some years.

The interests of all parties involved with The Millennium Series is a continual balancing act which of course can never make everybody happy all of the time. However, very few people have contacted The Millennium directly with any real complaints on these issues.

We hope this release has been of assistance in clarifying our position. If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us directly for further assistance.