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Marketing and Sponsorship

Lowe's Signs Multiyear Deal As Official NFL Sponsor

The NFL has signed a multiyear deal with Lowe’s, making it the league’s official home improvement retail sponsor. Plans are for Lowe’s to support NFL marketing platforms year-round, including the NFL Combine, Draft, Kickoff and Salute to Service. Beginning next season, Lowe’s will be presenting sponsor of the Super Bowl Experience fan fest. Lowe’s will have some NFL pass-through rights for its suppliers. The deal also should provide a distribution channel for NFL licensees. Lowe’s already sells NFL-logoed key blanks, coolers and lanyards. Publicis Media Sports & Entertainment, along with Publicis-owned media agency Starcom, helped negotiate the deal for Lowe’s, and is also consulting on strategy and activation. The NFL has been pursuing the home-improvement category for the past several years. Rival home center The Home Depot was an NFL corporate sponsor 12 years ago. One of the intriguing facets of this deal will be Lowe’s launching the sponsorship while Super Bowl LIII is in The Home Depot’s home city of Atlanta. Lowe’s will be able to have limited activation and signage at the Super Bowl within Mercedes-Benz Stadium despite The Home Depot being a principal sponsor of the stadium (Terry Lefton, THE DAILY).

HOME COOKING: BLOOMBERG NEWS' Eben Novy-Williams reports Lowe's will place billboards along Atlanta's highways and at the airport this week, and it id "taking over branding at one of the stadium gates during the game." Lowe's CMO Jocelyn Wong also addressed the "added drama" of activating in The Home Depot's home city. Wong: "I’m not going to lie, we’ve got a competitive spirit as well. So it was opportunistic ... and we wanted to absolutely leverage this deal." Novy-Williams notes Lowe’s "joins roughly 35 other leaguewide NFL partners," and becomes the seventh national partner to join the league "in the past year" alongside Sleep Number, Pizza Hut, Hewlett Packard, Amazon Web Services, Caesars Entertainment and Intuit (BLOOMBERG NEWS, 1/22). AD AGE's Adrianne Pasquarelli notes Lowe's new push "begins Feb. 1" and "includes national TV spots, radio, digital and social media as well as out-of-home." In addition, Lowe's will "use its new NFL sponsorship" to target shoppers "looking for heavier projects." However, Lowe's "will not have a spot in the Super Bowl" (ADAGE.com, 1/22). 

REMINDER THAT FOOTBALL IS KING: In Charlotte, Katherine Peralta notes the new Lowe’s-NFL deal "comes almost a year after the retailer decided to end its longtime sponsorship deal with seven-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson in order to 'invest in other strategic initiatives.'” NASCAR has been "struggling in recent years amid falling ticket sales, loss of sponsors and shrinking TV audiences." Meanwhile, football "remains Americans’ favorite sport to watch." Wong: "The NFL has the largest, most avid fan base. Live viewership is strong" (CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.com, 1/22).

NFL SPONS-O-METER: With Lowe's today joining the NFL as the league’s official home improvement retail sponsor, THE DAILY takes a look at an updated comprehensive list of the league's official corporate partners ahead of Super Bowl LIII. The group below does not include media partners.

SPONSOR
CATEGORY
SINCE
News America
Super Bowl FSI
`79
Gatorade (PepsiCo)
Sports nutrition
`83
Visa
Payment systems services
`95
Campbell's Soup
Soup
`98
FedEx
Package delivery services, office supply retailer
`00
Frito-Lay (PepsiCo)
Salted�snacks/popcorn/peanuts/dips/salsa
`00
Mars Snackfoods (Snickers/Skittles/M&M's)
Chocolate/non-chocolate confectionery
`02
Pepsi
Soft drinks
`02
Dairy Management Inc.
Dairy products (milk/yogurt/cheese)
`03
Bridgestone
Automotive tires
`07
Procter & Gamble (Febreze, Secret, Vicks, Head & Shoulders, Gillette, Secret, Old Spice, Tide)
OTC grooming, fabric/air care, household needs, OTC remedies
`09
Verizon*
Wireless, local long distance telecom services; smart communities services, digital media video services
`10
Barclays
Affinity card/rewards program
`10
Castrol
Motor oil
`10
Anheuser-Busch
Alcoholic beverages (beer, wine)
`11
USAA**
Auto, home, life insurance; military appreciation
`11
Bose
Home theater system, headsets, headphones
`11
Courtyard by Marriott
Hotel
`11
Quaker Oats (PepsiCo)
Hot cereal, granola bars
`12
Microsoft (Surface, Windows)
Tablets, laptops, operating systems
`11
Zebra Technologies
Real time location solutions, on-field player tracking
`14
Extreme Networks
Wi-Fi analytics, network solutions
`13
Nationwide**
Auto, home, life insurance
`14
Hyundai#
Passenger vehicles (cars, SUVs, crossovers, luxury)
`15
Dannon
Yogurt/yogurt-based smoothies
`15
Ford
Trucks
`16
Intel
Volumetric image/video capture
`17
Amazon Web Services
Cloud infrastructure, cloud platform, machine learning, AI
`17
Aramark
B2B marketing rights
`17
HP
3D foot scanning/video technology (for personalized cleats)
`17
McDonald's
QSR
`12
Pizza Hut
Pizza carry-out, delivery, frozen
`18
Sleep Number
Mattresses, sleep tracking, bedding, sleep/wellness
`18
Intuit
Financial services
`18
Caesars
Casino
`19
Lowe's
Home improvement
`19
NOTES: * = Verizon's deal for smart communities services and digital media video services is non-exclusive. ** = Nationwide and USAA have co-exclusivity in the auto/home/life insurance category. *** = Amazon Web Services deal is non-exclusive. # = Hyundai will not renew their deal after this season. List does not include the following licensees/partners: SiriusXM, Ticketmaster, Under Armour, New Era, Nike.
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