History of Sports

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History of Sports Entertainment Marketing
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Questions

• What do you know about the history of sports
  entertainment marketing?
• Can you name the people who were instrumental in
  the fields?
• What do disco beer have to do with the history
  of sports entertainment marketing?
• Do you feel marketing sports or entertainment is
  easier, more fun, or more glamorous than
  marketing auto parts or telephone service, why?

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Brief History of Leisure

• Sports entertainment marketers have always sold
  participation in sports and entertainment events
  to consumers.
• Consumers are the people who use the
  product/service.
• The growth of the industries has relied on
  consumers with free time, discretionary income,
  and a desire for recreation.
• Discretionary income - used to spend during
  your free time
• Consumer - A person who purchases goods and
  services for personal use.

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Brief History of Leisure

• Thomas Edison invented the KINETOSCOPE in the
  late 1890s.
• Kinetoscope early motion picture exhibition
  device
• The Kinetoscope

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Brief History of Leisure

• Eadweard Muybridge- 1878
• Was asked to settle a bet Do all four hooves
  leave the ground when horses run?
• First movie ever made

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Pastime.

• In America, organized sports and entertainment
  used to be a pastime just for wealthy
  consumers.
• In the mid- to late 1800s, only the wealthy had
  the time and money needed to go to the theater,
  ballet, horse races, or tennis.
• The working classes had little time away from
  daily labor.

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Entertainment for Everyone

• Thanks to public transportation, working class
  families could go across town to see an opera or
  game.

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William Bill Veeck (1914-1986)(Veeck-
pronounced VEK as in wreck)

• Key figure in the development of sports
  marketing.
• In the 1940s, he owned baseball teams
• Can you name them?
• Also drafted the first African-American player to
  the American League
• What was his name?

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Answers

• The teams were the Cleveland Indians and the
  Chicago White Sox.
• The American League hired Larry Doby in 1947,
  weeks after Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn
  Dodgers of theNational League.

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Veecks Innovations

• Bill Veeck was best known for his sports
  marketing innovations.
• Believed the consumer wanted to be involved in
  more than just the final score.
• Master of non-price promotion anything extra
  customers receive that is included with the
  purchase of a ticket
• Inventor of bat day
• Themes like ladies day

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Veeck as in wreck

• Everyday was Mardi Gras and every fan was
  king.
• He recognized the need to market something other
  than the core product.
• Give-a-way days had problems!
• May hinder souvenir or concession sales.
• Cap day should have a cap that doesnt resemble
  the souvenir that you would normally buy!

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Ill-conceived promo event

• Veeck created a 10 beer night in Cleveland in
  1974.
• The Story
• Drunken fans consumed an estimated 60,000 cups
  of beer -- sold for 10 cents each.
• What was the result in that promotion?

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The Result

• Drunken, unruly fans stormed the field during the
  game
• Ultimately led to the forfeiting of the game!

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Disco Demolition Night

• Bill Veeck, who owned the White Sox from 1958-61,
  bought the team again in December 1975 and tried
  every gimmick in his vast repertoire to lure
  people to the ballpark.
• The players wore shorts on the field.
• Showers were installed in the bleachers.
• And then, of course, there was Disco Demolition
  Night.
• Disco Demolition Night was held on July 12, 1979,
  at Comiskey Park.

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Disco Demolition Night

• The Sox would sell 98-cent tickets to any fan
  bringing a disco record to Comiskey Park and
  between games of a doubleheader, the records
  would be burned.
• It resulted in the White Sox forfeiting the
  second game to the Detroit Tigers as about 6,000
  fans poured onto the field, drinking beer,
  ripping up the turf, and improvising fires.
• The field was destroyed, thirty-seven fans were
  arrested, and Bill Veeck quit his job in
  embarrassment.

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Disco Demolition Night
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This disaster is still remembered!
Disco Night Video
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His other ideas

• Fireworks
• Dazzling scoreboards
• Special-event nights
• Free giveaways
• Fans Managers Night
• Fans voted on who would start and could even vote
  on play calls during the game

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Small person at the Plate

• In 1951, his second year with the Browns, Veeck
  was looking for something different to celebrate
  the 50th anniversary of the American League.
• He thought this was the perfect time to send a
  small person to the plate. Through a booking
  agency, he found Eddie Gaedel, who was
  three-foot-seven-inches tall and 65 pounds.
• He actually signed Gaedel to a contract and paid
  him 100. It would be a one-time deal and then
  Gaedel's baseball career was over.

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Early Days of TV and Marketing

• Nine TV Stations and fewer than 7,000 working TV
  sets after WWII.
• In October 194525,000 people came (over a three
  week period) to Gimbels Dept. Store in
  Philadelphia to watch the first large scale
  demonstration of TV
• The show was various NBC shows
• In the same year, the American Association of
  Advertising Agencies (AAAA) encouraged TV
  advertising.
• TV changed marketing in a BIG way.

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Light up!

• Cigarette manufacturers were one of the first
  industries to advertise widely on television.
• They had deep pockets and could afford to gamble
  on a new advertising medium, footing the bill for
  a host of early classic television programs.
• Ironically, in just a few short decades, they
  were cast away from the medium they helped create.

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Did You Know?

• Tobacco companies are spending more than 12.5
  billion a year on advertising and promotion but
  U.S. sales actually fell nearly 5.5 percent from
  2000 to 2005.
• In 2011, the tobacco industry spent 8.4 billion
  on cigarette advertising!
• Every day, 2000 kids light up for the first time.

Who is this?
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Vendors

• Vendors are the sellers of products.
• They compete for a share of the money people
  spend on recreation.

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Sports has

• Produced TV channels, movies, books, video games,
  theme restaurants, fashion trends, and magazines
• This blurs the line between sports and
  entertainment industries