Originally Posted by Nagasaki Joe

I think your question has been answered, but I'll chime in too, for what it's worth. When spoken fast enough, "Goran no sponsa" runs together and can sound like "Gran Sponsor" to the untrained ear, so that's probably what you heard but it has nothing to do with the word "Gran". In my early days in Japan, the commonly used phrase 実施中（jisshi chu) in TV commercials to mean that some sales campaign is "now underway" always sounded to me like the Japanese pronunciation for "beef stew" (ビーフシチュー) and confused me, so I understand your confusion.