Closing Shot: Allstate Stokes A Rivalry

The annual showdown between Oklahoma and Texas at the Cotton Bowl is one of the most anticipated games on the college football schedule.usa today

Allstate is building out its Monopoly board — and the 2023 Red River Rivalry is one of its shiniest new properties. The nearly 100-year-old insurance company has been a major player in college football for years and now enters its first season as the title sponsor for the annual matchup between Texas and Oklahoma.

“We’ve got such equity ownership in the sport that this will be kind of an easier breakthrough and we can take over the mantle a little bit easier than maybe the brand that’s not as entrenched,” said Dan Keats, Allstate’s director of sponsorships and consumer engagement. “Because when you have 10 years of equity [with the involved parties] that pays off …

“We’ve still got our work cut out for us, but I think because of all of the other things, all the other pieces on the Monopoly board we’ve got, I think it’ll be a smoother breakthrough with Red River for us.”

Allstate had hoped to jump into more early-season sponsorships beyond its two decades of work with the Sugar Bowl. Initially, the company wanted to continue working with the Dallas Cowboys on a kickoff game, before that fell through. That, in part, played into entering a multiyear agreement as a title sponsor for the Red River Rivalry, which will be played on Oct. 7 just a few weeks after the Allstate Crossbar Classic between Texas and Alabama in Tuscaloosa.

Texas had reached out to Allstate (previously an associate sponsor for Texas-OU) to gauge its interest in Red River as AT&T’s title sponsorship of the game neared expiration, Keats said. Fast forward to July and the official partnership was announced following negotiations with Learfield, which handles multimedia rights for Texas and Oklahoma and has aligned sponsors for the game since 1995. Allstate plans limited activation on-site at the game.

The Red River contest itself has seen a number of name changes throughout the last two decades. Long dubbed the Red River Shootout, it was renamed the Red River Rivalry in 2005 to distance itself from a name synonymous with gun violence. AT&T rebranded it the Red River Showdown in 2014.

Whether the move to become a title sponsor for the  matchup portends a longer-term thinking for Allstate about rivalry game sponsorships remains to be seen. Keats noted there are more layered logistics to sponsoring an on-campus game like Michigan-Ohio State or Alabama-Auburn compared to a neutral site game like Texas-OU, played at the Cotton Bowl.

That said, Allstate has been a prominent sponsor in college football. Its “Good Hands” field goal nets are commonplace throughout the sport. It will also be the title sponsor of four college football games this year between the Sugar Bowl, Red River Rivalry, Crossbar Classic and HBCU Legacy Bowl.

“I love playing Monopoly,” Keats quipped. “I like to own the Monopoly board. So the Sugar Bowl was kind of like our first hotel we put out there. With these tent poles, we’ve had these associate-level [sponsorships] … You start getting more, you put another hotel out — you own more things. That’s what this strategy has [allowed us to do].”