“Dollars just keep climbing for college kickoff games”

From SportsBusiness Journal

Review by Daniel Allen in KIN 332 (section 1)

The article, “Dollars just keep climbing for college kickoff games,” highlights the fierce, competitive industry for opening college football games that includes a neutral site and an illustrious high payout offer to both teams competing in the game. This wasn’t always the case though as the “kickoff” as it is called started back up in 2008. The idea was and still is to give two college football teams a chance to feel what it is to have a bowl like atmosphere while increasing excitement about the beginning of the new college football season. This year highlighted two big time programs, Alabama Crimson Tide and the Michigan Wolverines, in the Cowboy Classic. The payout for the game is anticipated to be about $9.4 million dollars with each team receiving about $4.7 million dollars after the game. The article continues to list big time neutral site openers for the 2012-13 year that are expected to bring in high revenue. With such high profile games and neutral sites the marketing aspect of this seems to be ingenious. First the schools still must market the game to their fan based audience which is sort of a tough position trying to market a game that could be hours away with higher ticket prices. How do you sell 25,000 tickets to your fans with a 20-50% spike in price? At the same time as a coach you must ask, “Do I want to lose a chance of hosting a home game while increasing the chance of being on a national stage and having future recruits witness your school on the big stage?” Being on a neutral site at a NFL stadium is a market itself to future recruits. Another big factor with these games that was brought up in the article is the advertising on TV with Dick’s Sporting Goods being the winner as they were the umbrella sponsor this past weekend with advertisements during all the games. Overall, in the sports marketing world this article is perfect as it hits many aspects involving sports marketing from many different views such as the coach, fans, players, future players, and marketing departments of big time companies.