From OregonLive.com
Review by Alex Boecker in KIN 332
For the 2002-2011 football seasons, Reebok had exclusive manufacturing and marketing rights over all of the NFL’s authentic and replica jerseys, sideline apparel, hats, and onfield footwear. That all changed late in 2011 when the NFL signed a 5 year contract with Nike for jersey manufacturing. This also meant that the new jersey designs wouldn’t be unveiled until April 3rd, 2012 which raised some worry. Recently, Nike had redesigned the Oregon Ducks football jerseys and had made them significantly more flamboyant than that of previous designs. Fans were worried that Nike would take the same approach to the new NFL jerseys making them look foolish. That was not the case thought, and many were quite pleased that Nike took a much more conservative route with the jerseys. Leo Kane, the NFL’s senior vice president of consumer products, said that they are “very happy with the partners we chose” and dismissed the idea that the recent Oregon Ducks design may have caused hesitation when choosing their new partner.
Although the Seattle Seahawks were the only team to receive completely redesigned uniforms, many teams are now boasting performance related improvements in the new uniforms such as lighter fabric and new pads where there were none before. Even though only one team has been wearing a new uniform design, it can be expected that many more will come under this new Nike contract, including the Vikings who are revealing their new uniforms on April 25th of this year. However, the league does set up some stipulations to make sure that teams are not constantly changing uniforms. Not only must the team talk to the NFL before talking to the apparel manufacturer, but they must also wait at least 5 years in between uniform changes.
While uniform changes can be very important to the image of a team, it is important not to overdo it. Fans want their teams to be attractive and have good looking apparel, but if you go over the top, such as the Oregon Ducks, it may turn off fans. Also, changing the image of a team too frequently can lower sales if fans cannot afford to keep purchasing the new apparel. That is why it is important for the marketers to stay ahead of the curve and aim for apparel that is going to be popular now as well as several years down the road.
Friday, April 19, 2013
Friday, April 12, 2013
"Newcastle stadium name-change lacks class and is unworthy of history"
From The Guardian
Review by Steven Golob in KIN 332
The article that I chose to discuss in class is a huge talking point in the sport of soccer worldwide. Soccer is a sport of very rich history and pride in one’s club that a person chooses to support. Items such as stadium names and team colors are a very important part of these clubs that fans are very hesitant to part ways with. This article examines, further, one of the biggest names in the Barclay’s English Premier, Newcastle United. Not only is Newcastle one of the oldest soccer clubs in England, it may well display of the greatest examples of historical significance and fan loyalty as a whole. That being said, this article explains that although the relatively new club owner’s decision to sell the name of the club’s stadium in order to make a bit more money makes sense financially, the supporters of the club have been up in arms about the decision since it was only a rumor.
Newcastle’s club owner, Mike Ashley, is merely doing what most other top-flight soccer clubs are doing in current times. They certainly aren’t even the first team to do this in the English Premier League, either. The article touches on other big-name clubs, such as Manchester City and Arsenal, in reference to the fact that their fans were not happy about the changing of their beloved stadium’s names at first, either. However, Mike Ashley has been able to run Newcastle quite stably with this stadium name-change producing more revenue for the club. It makes a lot of sense from a marketing standpoint as well. With a brand attached to the name of the stadium, it will be much easier to market the stadium as a whole. Using the old name, St. James’s Park, would be much more difficult even with the fans being able to identify that as their home stadium. Sports as a whole are so focused on making money from a marketing standpoint that they are very ready to toss tradition aside in order to keep teams afloat. It almost seems like a necessary evil that the fans might just have to accept in order to further enjoy sports.
"NCAA tournament 2013: James Madison’s Rayshawn Goins suspended for first half after arrest"
From the Washington Post
James Madison had its first taste of basketball success defeating Northeastern in the CAA Championship to secure a visit to the NCAA tournament. The basketball team got their 10 seconds of glory having a 30 second highlight reel of their win over Northeastern on ESPN. James Madison has never been known as a basketball powerhouse so they didn’t get much coverage on the championship win. Then came March 17th when star center Rayshawn Goins got arrested for obstruction of justice and disorderly conduct. The very next day James Madison had media coverage like they won an important game in the NCAA tournament. Before the incident the media coverage JMU got was small then the arrest happened and it blew up to a national story. James Madison had to act on the incident and decided to suspend star center Rayshawn Goins for the first half against LIU-Brooklyn. On March 19th The Washington Post wrote an article on the ordeal, which wasn’t the case after JMU won the CAA tournament. The media coverage brought James Madison into the limelight whether that’s good or bad that’s for you to decide.
This subject is relevant to this course because its shows what media is really after. The media wasn’t concerned with James Madison making the NCAA tournament for the first time since 1994, they cared about the off the court arrest. In this situation I learned media is more concerned with the repercussions stemming from off the field actions more than they are concerned with the results of the game. A lot of the attention was on James Madison only suspending Goins for a half. James Madison was wrong for only suspending Rayshawn for a half. In my opinion James Madison should have suspended Rayshawn for the entire game. The media coverage we got from the suspension showed that it was a soft penalty. In my opinion since we haven’t made the tournament since 1994, James Madison was hesitant to suspend Rayshawn for the entire game. One thing to come out of this whole ordeal is James Madison getting a lot of media attention over this, whether that’s good or bad press we will have to wait and see.
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