Saturday, October 8, 2011

"New Florida Marlins ballpark can guarantee fan comfort, but not wins"

From the Sun Sentinel


Review by Austin Hersh in KIN 332 (Section 1)

When a city has a baseball team that has just finished in the cellar of their division, has a very weak fan base and no clear sight of future success what do you do? Apparently in Miami, Florida, you build a brand new $515 million stadium.

The Florida Marlins have been the joke around the National League since their World Series championship in 2003. Not only due to the lack of talent, and lack of fan base, but to the fact that they were one of two Major League Baseball teams to still play in a football stadium. With ticket sales continuing to decline, the Marlins decided to move out of the stadium they have always called home.

The new facility features a retractable roof, climate control when the roof is closed and many other state of the art upgrades. But even with the new stadium and all of the excitement, the glamour of the ballpark will quickly wear off if there is no production on the field.

Even with opening day sellouts expected, baseball has to be the hardest professional sport to market due to the lengthy season. With promises to increase team payroll to attract fans, the Marlins seem to want to wait last minute to put a winning team on the field. But as the Minnesota Twins learned this season payroll does not win games. Since the inaugural season of the Twins new stadium, the team has gone from a division winning team to last place in the division all while increasing payroll by $97.7million. Money can buy many things, but team chemistry, and fan loyalty are not on that list.

Without the guarantee of the renovated team giving the fans what they want, it then falls on the marketing team to fill the new seats. The article speaks about a 41-game ticket package which includes marquee games against the Red Socks, and Yankees who have some of the most fan loyalty in all of sports.

Team President David Samson has stated, “It is the most important offseason in the history of our franchise.” The newly found hype and excitement about this ball club is something that has been lacking since the teams championship in 2003. The major question marks would also tend to mean that job security could be in question for many, if the Marlins continue their old ways in their new home.

"More College Athletic Departments Partner With State Lotteries"

From Athletic Business


Review by Zack Miller in KIN 435

There is an annual game every year between Oregon and Oregon State called the Civil War. The Oregon state lottery has seen this big game as a great opportunity to cash in on some promotion by getting sponsorship on a scratch off lotto ticket from Oregon State. They tried to have the same sponsorship from Oregon, but the university’s Athletic Director didn’t feel comfortable with the idea. Instead, while Oregon State has their official logo on the ticket, Oregon has allowed promotional presence to the state lottery at each of its seven home games this year. The lottery offers a good sum of money, $60,000, for allowing the promotional use of the schools. Oregon’s IMG general manager stated that it would be hypocritical to accept the money and not allow some form of promotion for the lottery. After all, the state lotteries have given over $11 million to Oregon in the last 20 years, and over $10 million to Oregon State. I believe that the state lottery has done an excellent job in marketing and finding an easy way to use the classic rivalry game to help promote their product. The ticket is a basic two dollar scratch off and therefore is not a big expenditure for fans who want to try their luck. What is interesting is the difference in the way they have gotten promotion from the two schools. While the “Civil War” game is a state wide event, it is my opinion that Oregon actually offered a better deal to the lottery than Oregon State gives. By being able to show up at all seven home games and have a consistent presence, the loyal fans who show up at every game will realize that state lottery has an invested interest in their school. Therefore, they might be able to sell more lottery products rather than the one big game promotion that Oregon State gives. 

---

Review by Dale Robins-Bailey in KIN 435

The question of state lottery affiliation has surfaced recently with many top schools and their football programs having to make decisions. Teams like Oregon, Oregon State and Iowa have all recently signed agreements to be affiliated with their respective state lotteries. Questions of hypocrisy have been raised as some schools do accept lottery funding from the state but choose to opt out of being used in promotional lottery games. Sales of lottery scratch games would increase in those areas if they used local university teams to market them.

Recently a lot of programs have started to jump on the lottery bandwagon but there are some that feel it is not ethical to promote gambling. Some schools do not even agree with the NCAA’s rather unclear stance on the matter. The NCAA prohibits affiliation with state lotteries at NCAA championship events but looks the other way as regards to conference and out of conference games. Their official stance is that they are opposed to all types of gambling but do realize there are financial and promotional benefits of such an affiliation. Having said that the NCAA seems hypocritical in itself as it does allow gambling at the conference level at the same time as wanting to be seen as taking the moral high ground. They are aware that some members of their organization feel that the benefits of being linked with gambling establishments such as Casino’s can help market their schools. The NCAA it is missing out on a huge revenue source here as sales of tickets from championship events would surely bring in more money than conference games.

Schools are now beginning to see the benefits of a partnership with state lotteries. With over 43 states offering lotteries, it is a huge opportunity for advertising. The marketing implications mean that both schools and lotteries benefit from the advertising as schools gain exposure from scratch cards and other promotions, and the lottery improves its public relations when schools make it know they are benefiting from lottery funding. Programs include the Bright Futures program at the University of Miami.

In all, the article highlights the opinions of schools and organizations on the partnership with state lotteries.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

"Fee-Fi-Fo-Funds"

From Athletics Management

Review by Rocky Morris Jr. in KIN 435 


This article discusses different ways to introduce or raise fees to increase the revenue of athletic departments within NCAA school divisions. Most of the schools that have already implemented an increase in these fees discuss how they have handled this situation when it is presented to the school as a whole and what sorts of reactions take place. The Athletic Directors of these schools see the fees as a necessary income to be able to compete at the highest level that they can at their given conferences, while understanding that it is difficult to convince an already money-strapped school to justify increasing tuition costs. For the majority of the schools in the article, they listed that they reached out to the students in one way or another and made sure that there was appropriate communication as to why fees needed to be gathered. The Athletic Director from Missouri State implemented the help of a student committee and ran a campaign to help promote a fee. At Georgia Tech, a pre-planned committee made up of only a handful of individuals decides on whether to raise additional costs, while a vote at California State University Long Beach went against a price increase because of the possible technological issue of new voting methods that didn’t quite resonate with students. Afterward, a re-collaboration from different department heads decided on a student excellence fee to bring in more funds. Still at other schools such as Buffalo State College, a fee increase means a lot and must go through much scrutiny and possible cuts to athletic budgets before getting passed. Education of why raising fees is beneficial and working together ultimately wins over the drawbacks.

---

Review by Brent Henchen in KIN 435

Every semester colleges go through an internal struggle it seems as to whether or not to increase tuition and fees. Especially with the value students and alumni place on sports, there is continually mounting pressure on college athletics to perform well; and sometimes they need more funds to stay with the competition. So, those schools are forced to increase student fees. In “Fee-Fi-Fo-Funds” Dennis Read asks directors from different school how they increase fees and asks what the resulting consequences are. In most colleges, like Missouri State, Utah State, and Georgia Tech, an increase in fees has to be passed by a legislative body. And that body usually contains current students. Dennis investigates the reactions to fund increases and examines ways in which some directors have gotten bills to increase fees approved by the required number of students.

A few of the techniques the administrators have used are to: try to influence student leaders, who will in turn influence a lot of the student body; view the proposal from the student’s perspective in order to know what benefits to convey to the students; educate the students on the athletic department’s needs; putting together a student committee to help; show the fees they charge in relation to the fees charged by other schools in the same conference, and so on. These methods, some of them used together, were mostly successful. Fees increased without upsetting a majority of the student body.

This article can help other administrators with a list of do’s and don’ts when trying to increase fees for athletics. Every year it seems more money is needed to keep up with a growing college or college athletic program. Knowing how to “sell” a fee increase is very important for maintaining a balanced budget and staying out of debt. The same selling tactics cannot be used year after year, so new persuasive arguments will need to be used, which will require administrators to continually face the problem of convincing students and faculty to approve an increase in student fees. Therefore, a universal answer to this problem cannot be determined, but instead temporary answers will have to be implemented and disposed of yearly.