Women's Tennis Changes Its Game

There was no honeymoon for Stacey Allaster when she became chief executive officer of WTA, the women's pro tennis tour, in 2009. The recession had squeezed sports that depend heavily on corporate sponsors. The tennis circuit, then called the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, hadn't signed a new sponsor in four years. Worse, its contract with Sony Ericsson was about to expire. "When I first started, a lot of people were saying 'Do you know what you are getting yourself into?'" recalls Allaster.

Less than two years later, Allaster has rebranded the tour, retained its biggest corporate supporter, and closed on a record $75 million in sponsorship deals. Allaster, once a junior tennis player in Canada, has signed three new corporate sponsors for the women's tour in the past year. The WTA says it's close to signing two more for its season-ending championships, to be held in Istanbul for the next three years. "It wasn't always that easy, but she's done well in using the best things that the tour has to offer," says four-time Grand Slam champion Kim Clijsters.