A
fter guiding FedEx through massive business-to-business deals in the NFL over a decade, it’s no wonder Jody Bennett regards the FedEx Field naming-rights pact with the Washington Redskins as something that forever changed her career.
Jody Bennett
CHARGE,
VICE PRESIDENT, OPERATIONS
She helped broker the deal in 1999 during her time with the agency now known as Team Epic, and it’s a deal that has led FedEx to earn at least nine figures’ worth of new revenue, said Bennett, now vice president of operations for Charge, the agency formerly known as U/S Sports Advisors. But along the way, the naming-rights agreement, which she helped renegotiate multiple times, also helped her career development.
“I learned so much from it because I was working for an agency … and even though I was employed by the agency, I really was ingrained in FedEx’s business, but I also was on-site working as a property,” said Bennett, who still consults for FedEx via a partnership with Team Epic (and still has an office at FedEx Field). “So I felt like a FedEx employee, I felt like a Redskins employee, but yet I also felt like a founder of Team Velocity, [which became] Team Epic.”
Bennett, who helps oversee Charge’s work with NASCAR among other key accounts, also has years of experience in the business-to-consumer side of sports marketing during her career, which also includes time with Aquarius Sports & Entertainment.
“I focused on the business of sports rather than just focusing on sports and I think it’s true to this day: People are like, ‘Oh I love sports; I love football,’ [but] I’ve always taken the approach to understand the business and how can you treat sports as a business,” Bennett said. “By looking at sports more as a business — even 20-some years ago — [it] has helped me be successful.”
— Adam Stern
