Given the impending and apparently inevitable NFL lockout, here’s some news that you may not read in this space for quite some time: The NFL has a new corporate sponsor. Consumer electronics brand
Bose has quietly signed on as a league partner starting this spring in a three-year deal that gives Bose rights to market products like its high-end headphones, home audio and home theater systems (speakers, etc.) with NFL marks.
The last element is particularly intriguing, since the NFL, whose relationship with TV is at the heart of its success, has been unable to find a television manufacturer as a league sponsor since Samsung left after the 2009-10 season.
While we’re told the rights are limited to home audio, it is interesting to note that Bose introduced a $5,350 integrated TV/surround sound system last year.
Since the stereotype of a pro athlete usually includes expensive headphones, we could see some synergy there. For example, Skullcandy has NBA players as endorsers and sells NBA and NCAA-licensed versions of its headphones.
Bose has been relatively sponsor-shy. As part of its affiliation with Porsche, for which it supplies auto sound systems, Bose sponsors the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in Germany.
We’ll be interested to see whether the NFL can get Bose to support its game broadcasts with ad buys since the Bose marketing budget usually supports long-form TV ads, Internet and other forms of direct-response advertising. That could indicate buys on NFL.com and NFLNetwork.com. We’d also like to know whether Bose gets pass-through rights, since NFL indicia could be powerful sales tools at its biggest retailers like Best Buy and Target, or within its own chain of more than 125 Bose-branded stores.
NFL sponsorship chief Keith Turner had no comment.
WHO’S WORRIED?: While certainly all NFL business partners will be looking for the kind of contractual relief EA has received (SportsBusiness Journal, Feb. 14-20 issue), for now the party line is maintaining the status quo.
Trading cards are the products most analogous to video games, since they can’t operate without league and player intellectual property. Mark Warsop, CEO of NFL trading card licensee Panini America, said he’s been told there will be a draft and rookie photo shoot, which will allow Panini to make new products. “Adapting if there is a lockout is on everyone’s mind,” he said. “You are as nervous as you allow yourself to be. Of course, this is a rookie-driven business, and while there’s always a gap between draft [day] and when they get on the field, a longer gap is a concern.”
While Anheuser-Busch is replacing Coors as the league beer sponsor, parent MillerCoors is among the NFL’s biggest media buyers and maintains more than 20 NFL team sponsorships, including the Dallas Cowboys and the now-Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers. Regarding a potential labor stoppage, “Clearly, it’s nothing we’d wish for, but there’s not much we can do about it, and there’s other sports media we can buy in the fall,” said Jackie Woodward, MillerCoors vice president of marketing services.
“I’d be lying if I told you my NFL clients were not looking for some relief on their obligations, and we’re working on that,” said Genesco head John Tatum, whose clients with NFL sponsorship ties include Motorola, Pepsi, Campbell Soup, MillerCoors and Verizon. “But the timelines and the pressures EA works with are considerably different and I think most of us recognize that, so what they worked out seems appropriate.”
NIKE’S NFL NICHE: While every other NFL business partner is worried about how much a work stoppage, or even the threat of one, would hurt their business, Nike is not. Its on-field apparel rights don’t begin until 2012.
“When we were analyzing the deal, we knew this couldn’t have been better timing for us. The next thing we really have to deliver NFL-wise is a Nike/NFL jersey for the top pick in the 2012 draft to be holding,” said John Slusher, Nike vice president of global sports marketing. Nike will start selling the line to retailers in early summer and is promising innovation for products that can’t be sold to consumers until April 2012.
“I don’t think this league is ready for something as different as the Oregon Ducks [BCS] look yet,” Slusher said, “but we’re taking football on as a category approach now. The NFL is now at the top of that pyramid, and we have to deliver product for on and off the field that matches that.”
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| Kristick |
PREMIER PARTNER: Sport marketing veteran
John Kristick is joining
Premier Partnerships as managing director. Premier is also promoting Chief Operating Officer
Jeff Marks to the company’s management board as a managing director.
Kristick’s résumé includes considerable global experience. He was based in Europe for 15 years, where he was an executive director for Infront Sports & Media in Switzerland. More recently he was managing director for the USA Bid Committee, which oversaw the attempt to bring the 2022 FIFA World Cup to the U.S.
His sports marketing career began in 1992 working as promotions director for ISL Marketing in support of the 1994 FIFA World Cup. Still, Kristick, who will be based in Maryland, said his focus will be looking to reach into “new markets and new places, but with the same focus on sales representation and consulting.”
Terry Lefton can be reached at tlefton@sportsbusinessjournal.com.
