It's been an eventful year for Jonathan Kraft, vice chairman of the New England Patriots and president and chief operating officer of the Kraft Group, which owns the Patriots, the New England Revolution and Gillette Stadium. It's been the kind of year he's dreamed about since his family bought the Patriots in 1994.
The Patriots captured their first Super Bowl title, beating the St. Louis Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI. The Revolution advanced to its first Major League Soccer championship game before losing to the Los Angeles Galaxy in the MLS Cup on Oct. 20. And the $350 million-plus privately financed Gillette Stadium, the new home to the Patriots and Revolution, opened in May — a project spearheaded by the 38-year-old Kraft, the son of Patriots owner and chairman Robert Kraft.
That's all a far cry from '94.
At that time, the Patriots were lackluster on the field, mired near the bottom of NFL team-revenue rankings and bogged down by talk of relocation. They had only 20,000 season-ticket holders, who watched a club that played in a dilapidated stadium.
"Our goal was to change the image and perception of the franchise and the NFL" in the Boston market, Kraft recalls. "We wanted to make the Patriots and the NFL respectable in Boston and New England."
Today, the Patriots are one of the top revenue-producing teams in the league — along with the Washington Redskins and Houston Texans. Kraft would not divulge revenue figures, but industry sources estimated that the Patriots will surpass $200 million in revenue this year.
The Patriots play in front of packed houses at 68,436-seat Gillette Stadium, 56,000 of those being season-ticket holders, and there's a waiting list of 50,000 more season-ticket requests.
Kraft was even able to sell naming rights for the new stadium twice before its first NFL game.
Originally called CMGI Field, the stadium got a new moniker in early August when Boston-based Gillette Co. replaced CMGI Inc., an Internet company headquartered in Andover, Mass., as naming-rights partner. Gillette's willingness to put its name on the stadium enabled CMGI to gracefully opt out of the 15-year, $114 million deal that it had signed in August 2000.
Once CMGI made it clear that it wanted out, it was Kraft who led the effort to secure a new naming-rights agreement.
Kraft declined to disclose the financial terms of Gillette's 15-year deal. But he said that between what Gillette is paying, what CMGI had already paid on its deal and what the Internet company will continue to spend with the Patriots, "We're ahead of the game. ... We're happy with where we ended up."
CMGI will maintain a marketing relationship with the Patriots, spending $1.6 million a year from 2003 through 2015.
Kraft also is responsible for devising the strategy to generate revenue from the stadium. "Going forward, we'll use the stadium as a foundation from which to extend the Patriots brand, while making sure that we don't dilute it," he said.
The Patriots struck numerous long-term sponsorship deals tied, in part, to the new stadium. Club lounges inside Gillette Stadium are booked through the rest of the year for corporate sales meetings, trade shows and the like. There's even been some preliminary talk about the possibility of holding the Patriots' summer training camp on the grounds.
All of which, Kraft said, is designed to keep the product on the field respectable.
"Above all else, we committed resources to winning on the field," he said.
"It's about persevering at all costs. If you believe in something and you're willing to persevere, you can overcome a lot."
