Wyatt Hamilton's Blog

Red Bull is a globally recognized brand, made famous by its energy drinks. Created in 1987 by Dietrich Mateschitz the Austrian beverage company now has the market share for beverages worldwide. Their product is advertised aggressively in high intensity sport markets such as hockey, mountain biking, BMX, motocross, windsurfing, snowboarding, skateboarding, kayaking, wakeboarding, cliff-diving, surfing, soccer, skating, freestyle motocross, rally car and Formula 1 racing. 

Red Bull has strived to associate themselves with extreme, dangerous and successful athletes and teams. Specifically, the EC Red Bull Salzburg hockey club has been the top team in professional European hockey perennially. Their success however, has been anything but a mistake or fluke.

Owner Dietrich Mateschitz has poured massive amounts of funding into EC Red Bull Salzburg. Mateschitz has overseen everything from a completely renovated state of the art rink, a travel bus that could rival any hockey players dream, massive advertising campaigns, personalized Red Bull decaled cars for each player, and most importantly, attracting and bringing in world class talent to perform on their superior stage.

Whenever the Red Bulls play, travel, or make public appearances, they are covered in, and represented by the famous red bovines. This is a perfect example of brand equity, and how the energy drink giant wants to associate itself with success and vice versa. The team wants to be recognized as elite, and associated with the giant who is Red Bull Sport.

In my previous blog I commented on how unattractive the obscenely ad-covered hockey jerseys are in the European leagues. However, in retrospect I find myself being slightly hypocritical, because I really think what the EC Red Bull Salzburg has done as far as a total package image is really quite effective.

EC Red Bull Salzburg

It is no secret that for professional sports, a significant source of income for teams and owners is produced by selling advertisement space. And why wouldn’t they, for it’s a great business opportunity for both parties. The owners can make a profit that can go towards buying better players, improving their facilities or towards the marketing of their own team. Companies on the other hand, are using the stage of professional sports to advertise to thousand of potential consumers who are dialed in and eager to watch.

The space available for adverti-sement however, is not always facility or arena specific. The issue I have with this topic, is when the want for money becomes so great, that advertisers push boundaries and very square inch of a uniform is up for sale. I realize it is a business, and making a profit is key, but I believe it is important for sport to hold onto its traditional values. Specifically, looking like a traditional hockey player is a huge part of hockey heritage.

Professional hockey in Europe has moved towards a trend where you aren’t watching hockey players…you’re watching skating billboards.

Granted, European hockey doesn’t have the endorsement dollars that, for example, the National Hockey League may have, so in a sense I can understand why they need to use any means necessary to create extra income.  But “littering” their uniforms in order to make money is in my opinion trashy, desperate and distracting. When you’re unable to distinguish a team logo from amongst all the clutter, I think it is time to take a step back and pump the breaks on uniform advertising.

Personally, I’m glad North American hockey has embraced a simpler look. The fans appreciate it more, for it creates a clearer team identity for the fans to relate to.  Legacy and tradition are deeply situated in team jersey’s, and although logo’s and colors do evolve, North American players look classy on the ice, and everyone knows that style matters.

Two different blogs this week both touched on similar themes. Scott Wasden and Kaylee Astle talked about risqué advertising, and how it may grab the attention of consumers, but can also lead to negative associations towards a brand. Every firm is ultimately in control of how they want to advertise they’re products, and what image it will create for them.

This made me think of major sponsorships in professional sports. Corporations spend significant amounts of money in order to advertise along side teams in every major sport in North America. A lot of controversy has been in the news lately about Air Canada and their threats to pull sponsorship from the NHL if they don’t start addressing certain on ice matters, more specifically head shots.
For those of you who are unsure of the incident that sparked these discussions, it happen in Montreal in a game between the Montreal Canadiens and the Boston Bruins. Zdeno Chara hit Montreal forward Max Pacioretty into the side boards. He suffered serious head truama and had to be taken off on a stretcher. Chara was assessed a major penalty but no further disciplinary actions were taken by the league for it was deemed unintentional; a clean hit that lead to unfortunate consequences.
Air Canada’s director of marketing Denis Vandal wrote a letter to the NHL offices saying “Unless the NHL takes immediate action with serious suspension to the players in question to curtail these life-threatening injuries, Air Canada will withdraw its sponsorship of hockey.”

Personally, I am having trouble legitimizing the boldness of this statement and with what Air Canada is trying to do. It is no secret that hockey is a physical sport and injuries do occur, but there is little doubt that Air Canada was not aware of this physicality and risk involved in the game before they began their sponsorship of six Canadian and five American NHL teams. Regardless of the airline’s intention, pulling sponsorship in Canada alone would seem to be bad business for an already struggling company. Canadians hold such passion for hockey, and for Air Canada to step in and give the National Hockey League an ultimatum will only drive customers away from them. This threat (which seems to become emptier each day) has  garnered a lot of negative attention, and has left fans and customers with a distaste towards Air Canada as a brand.

Lets face it , Air Canada as an airline company hasn’t always proven themselves to be a fan favorite. With the availability of so many quality alternatives, choosing an airline such as West Jet won’t be much of a push outside of a loyal consumer’s comfort zone. This time however, good intentions aside, Air Canada may have done the pushing themselves.

Nothing like a surprise sunny day in Vancouver when the forecast called for rain all day long! The spring is a great time of year, the sun shines just a little bit more, the temperature continues to rise and everyone starts shedding the clothing layers. It also gets me exceptionally excited for a few things; beach season, outdoor tennis, slo-pitch ball tournaments, patio drink…ahhhh studying and most importantly the NHL playoffs! A couple days ago the Vancouver Sun published an article about a topic I touched on in one of my previous posts about the NHL’s “History Will Be Made” campaign. Not only was it the NHL’s most successful ad campaign to date, but its coming back for another year.

That’s just about as good of an excuse as any to hit up YouTube and watch some new commercials. If you don’t want to wait till March 13th when NBC starts airing the commercials on network TV, then click below and get a taste of the new videos. I enjoyed them and think you will too.

Your welcome.

One other point I found extremely interesting in the article by Mac Perry, was how he touched on the distribution of the ads. They “will be distributed on TV, online, radio, print, in-arena, in stories, mobile and social media platforms of the NHL, NBC and Versus, along with NBA Universal platforms, such as MSNBC and CNBC.” Many different platforms are essential in order to reach the broadest fan base possible. Funny how things in real life link up to class material.

The NHL last season had its most watched playoffs in 36 seasons last year, one can only hope they surpass that this year.

Lately the talk of pricing has been thrown around a lot and that has made me think about how professional teams charge admission. I believe one of the best places to look would be the home of “The Great 8”, Alexander Ovechkin.

The Great 8 - Alexander Ovechkin

He is fast, skilled, aggressive, and most importantly entertaining. Since entering the NHL in the 2005-06 season, he has won countless awards, scoring titles, resurrected a failing franchise, accepted a key to the city, penned numerous endorsement deals, oh and signed one of the richest contracts in leagues history at 13 years $124 million. He is THE face of not only the Washington Capitals but also the NHL.

So I guess the question behind the Capitals decision to invest that sort of dollar amount in one player is…Does price indicate quality?

When Ovi joined the Caps, he took them from a team that had trouble getting any fans at all, to a franchise that has the hottest ticket in town where everyone will do just about anything to get their hands on them. The Washington Post’s Dan Steinberg had an interesting blog about how the Caps have raised ticket prices for the third season in a row. They have moved from a sale to profit orientation pricing scheme; even with these increases they are still in the bottom third of the league for average season ticket sales, which goes to show how low their ticket prices were before Ovi.

Personally I think it is hard not to justify this guys contract. His marketability is something every other NHL front office drools over and wished they had. ESPN featured Ovechkin on E:60;

if one player can do this for your team…give the dog a bone… scratch that, 124 million bones.

Recently I was encountered a blog about Social Media on Graeme Law’s page. He points out that the value of Social Media may be over exaggerated and the sum of its abilities may be far fetched. This made me think about the importance of Social Media and the affect it has on professional sport. More specifically Twitter.

Cue:

Paul Bissonnette AKA: Biznasty2point0

He is the living, breathing proof of the power of Twitter.

For years professional hockey players have been stereotyped by the media as having no personality and only giving cookie cutting answers. But then again the press probably wouldn’t be jumping over tables to interview a 4th line forward for the Phoenix Coyotes who averages 5 minutes of ice per game.

Biznasty allows a new generation of fans to see what professional players are really like behind the scenes via 140 characters at a time. He doesn’t give scripted cliché comments about the previous nights game to be broadcasted all over North American TV’s every morning. He tweets about anything and everything from celebs, other sports, girls, nights out, favourite songs  and even his clothing line he developed. Yes NHL players are highly skilled athletes, playing on an enormous stage every other night, but they are also 20 to 30 year old males who like to relax and enjoy each other’s company. They do have lives and personalities away from the rink and Twitter allows people to see that.

Recently The Hockey News released their Top 100 People of Power and Influence list. Out of 700 players in the NHL only 17 made this list. Paul Bissonnette was one of those players. At 2200 thoughts of wisdom and 50,000 followers growing exponentially Biznasty2point0 is changing how fans observe the players and the NHL as a whole.

When an organization focuses its marketing efforts not purely on product, but on a portrayal of emotion, consumers are driven by affection. It is that emotional reaction that can prove to be more appealing to a consumer than the physical product itself. The National Hockey League this past spring did a remarkable job of “selling” the emotionality of the Stanley Cup playoffs with a series of TV advertisements. They focused their efforts on appealling to loyal and new fans alike, and on the amount of emotion, heart and dedication the players feel during their relentless fight to win professional sports’ most difficult trophy.

They differentiated the value of playoffs from the regular season. The NHL regular season is 82 games over five months. That is a lot of hockey to be played in a short period and not every game is the very best quality. The regular season is a grind, 30 teams all have one goal is to make the playoffs. It is during the playoff run when the best players in the world prove themselves, do anything to keep their teams alive; fight for 16 wins over two and half months, and ultimately hoist Lord Stanley’s cup.

Playoffs are a different breed, its when inspiring story lines develop, heroes emerge, and cities come together.

Personally one of my absolute favorite things about the media surrounding NHL playoffs is the footage captured of the player and fan’s emotional responses. CBC annually creates an inspiring montage of this footage, and for fans young and old, especially in Canada, it’s hard not to get shivers when these are watched. It’s a visual display of grown men playing the game they love, chasing a dream they’ve had since they were kids on the frozen pond in the backyard or on the street playing ball hockey. The passion and excitement that players, coaches and fans have for the playoffs is contagious, and the NHL has done an exceptional job of recreating and selling those emotions in its promotional ads!

Many athletic organizations use their status in the community to raise awareness about non-profit organizations. Hockey in particular at the professional level, have foundations that provide volunteer support and financially  help charities involving children, the homeless, shelter, research and the sick just to name a few. The Vancouver Canucks are known for “Canucks for Kids Fund,” which through a variety of programs in which Canucks players and employees participate, along side corporate partner sponsors to raise funds. The Calgary Flames also have a similar program called the “Flames Foundation For Life” that has a commitment to education, medical research, health, amateur sports and recreation.These teams use readily available resources such as the media to promote philanthropic efforts within their fan base. A win-win situation, fans appreciate what the teams are doing in the community which helps with their promotion and popularity.

A common thing junior hockey teams do across Canada in December is the annual Teddy Bear Toss where fans are encouraged to bring stuffed bears to the game and when the home team scores the first goal they throw them on the ice. These bears are then given to charities in the community for kids who need them.

UBC hockey is involved heavily with breast cancer month. One marketing promotion athletics could possibly do is, similar to the teddy toss, have a bra toss. Players could go around to local businesses and collect pledges per bra (ie: dollar a bra), then have one home game during that month where fans throw bras on the ice. Along with the donations raised, the Thunderbirds could donate the bras to a local women’s shelter or somewhere else where they are needed.

This will get players, students and fans involved in something worthwhile and bring them out to the games!

How do you get people into the doors of hockey games on campus? First you need to find the target market. What kind of person should UBC athletics focus on to market their University hockey to? Once they have found the right demographic that will bring in the most people, how do you promote games and the product on the ice effectively?

I believe that UBC does not have a broad enough spectrum of people they aim to come to the games. The Doug Mitchell Sports Center is the most used athletic facility on campus by non-UBC affiliates. On weekends and nightly during the week, all three ice surfaces during the winter months are booked solid by minor hockey, men’s leagues and public skates. Many families that are involved in minor hockey are younger and in many cases have a lower income. They come to the rink weekly for practices and games, but leave right after their ice times with little to any knowledge of the inexpensive entertainment of Varsity Men’s hockey.

Currently on campus, really the only form of advertisement for Varsity games is one weekly minuscule poster that is displayed sparsely around campus. Some reading right now may not even know which posters I am referring to, and that is exactly mypoint. They are over powered by words and give little to no visual stimulation. The UBC student body and community alike will be hard pressed to stop and acknowledge what the posters are trying to promote. To promote effectively, customers need to be attracted to advertise-

ments. UBC athletics has the available means to do so whether that involves; more appealing posters properly distributed, television ads on campus screens and local stations, social media like twitter, or better online promotion via campus wide emails.

Just one example of an eye catching poster: Red Bull Crashed Ice. Which one would you stop to stare at?

Hockey is all around us. Turn on the TV, open a newspaper, walk down the street and you will seem something that has to do with the sport. In this past year coverage and popularity has grown not even in Canada but in the United States as well. You would be hard pressed to find anyone in Vancouver who doesn’t know what the “golden goal” is and who scored it last February.

I’m positive most students can relate to being strapped for cash while they are attending University, making cost effective entertainment all the more important. In Vancouver people fork over vast amounts of money to go watch hockey in the form of the Vancouver Canucks, and why not, they are the big dogs in town. But right here on campus students have the opportunity to watch great hockey for 1% of the price. So in a brand new 5,054-seat 47.8 million dollar arena watching fellow University student-athletes, some of which have been drafted to the same league as the Vancouver Canucks play, the question raised why is there not more of a fan base?

One of the major factors for lack of attendance I believe is due to the lack of marketing. UBC athletics has 3/4 components to the marketing mix at their fingertips:

• Product: University hockey. (6 players NHL Draft picks, 11 attended NHL try-out camps)
• Price: $2 Students, $5 Children/ Seniors, $10 General Admission
• Place: Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre (47.8 mill, 5,054 seat arena)
• Promotion: …?

If students don’t know about the games, how are they supposed to come watch? The potential to bring out fans and have a great atmosphere every weekend is unlimited. In coming posts I will share my ideas on how to make this happen!!