Sponsorship is the fastest-growing marketing communication tool, both in terms of

volume and complexity. The two central players in any sponsorship arrangement are

the sponsor and the sponsored institutions’ (sponsee). Sponsors are gradually

increasing the amounts that they invest in sponsorships and elevating outcome

requirements for their investments, as reflected in the large body of research

dedicated to sponsors’ needs in terms of brand awareness, consumer loyalty and

evaluation of results. On the other hand, the sponsees needs are relatively

neglected, especially in the arts sector, where there has been little research focused

on what arts sponsees require from a sponsorship arrangement. This research fills

this gap by investigating the sponsorship process that arts sponsees go through and

provides the first theoretical model of this process. Because of the need to

inductively explain the process, taking into account its causes and consequences,

the grounded theory method is used to develop a substantive theoretical model. Indepth

interviews with 31 arts sponsorship managers, globally dispersed and with

demonstrated experience in sponsorship, were collected, and they indicate that the

arts sponsee’s reciprocity with a sponsor in a sponsorship interaction is a highly

complex experience that involves both the internal arts sponsee and external

sponsor’s actors. Within the complexity of the experience, the relationship is

arguably not a developmentally normal experience, given arts sponsees’

professional situations. The conclusion is that the reciprocity that arts sponsees

experience throughout the sponsorship interaction is often not acknowledged or

understood and would benefit from further empirical research.