Marketplace Roundup
The Tampa Bay Super Bowl Host Committee yesterday launched its "Super Host" public hospitality campaign. The multimedia campaign is designed to rally local residents to put Tampa Bay's best face forward in celebration of Super Bowl XLIII. TV ads showcasing Tampa residents with their game faces will begin airing on WFLA-NBC next week, while lighthearted radio spots will air on all six CBS Radio stations in the Tampa Bay market. There also will be eight CBS Outdoor billboards across Hillsborough and Pinellas counties. Print ads begin running in The Tampa Tribune and online at TBO.com starting Thursday. Thousands of buttons, posters and POP displays will be distributed in late January to area restaurants, stores and hospitality industry partners (Tampa Bay Super Bowl Host Committee).
FLY PATTERN: The ATLANTA BUSINESS CHRONICLE's John Manasso reports AirTran Airways is "getting an unexpected lift from its alliance with a group" of Falcons players. AirTran is not the official airline of the Falcons, as the rights belong to Delta, but AirTran VP/Marketing & Sales Tad Hutcheson said that its endorsement deals with individual players have "convinced many people the Falcons are aligned" with the airline. Hutcheson said that research with focus groups and a quantitative survey "has revealed that customers believe AirTran is the team's official airline." Hutcheson: "They listen to the commercials with [RBs] Jerious Norwood and Michael Turner and see them endorsing and they think we are the official airline for the Falcons, and we're not. I think that's fine. ... It's amazing, it really influences people's buying habits. It is absolutely amazing to me" (ATLANTA BUSINESS CHRONICLE, 1/2 issue).
OFF COURSE: In Hartford, Diane Levick reported the Connecticut Insurance Department said that sporting event insurer Kevin Kolenda, who is doing business under the names Hole-in-Won Worldwide and Golf Marketing Worldwide, "has illegally operated an unlicensed insurance business and failed to pay for holes-in-one" at the '07 PGA Tour Travelers Championship and an '08 tournament in Trumbull, Connecticut. The $5.9M fine is "one of the largest -- if not the biggest -- ever imposed by the department." Kolenda "claimed he's no longer president of or affiliated with the two companies and that they were sold, but he wouldn't say when or to whom" (HARTFORD COURANT, 1/5).
NOTES: Patriots DT Vince Wilfork has signed a deal with Massachusetts-based Bob's Discount Furniture and will appear in three 30-second TV spots for the store. Terms of the deal were not disclosed (BIZJOURNALS.com, 1/5)....Dynamic Sports & Entertainment (DSE) has signed a sponsorship sales agreement to rep the King of Wake and Queen of Wake pro wakeboarding circuits (DSE).
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