Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly - S9E03 - Putting Fans In Stands: How Sports Teams Sell Tickets

Episode Date: January 16, 2020

This week, we look at the fascinating ways sports teams market themselves. We’ll unpack why one stadium replaced its ushers with librarians, why another encouraged fans to wear “awful" clothes and how a grammatical error put Toronto on the map. It all comes down to a strategic…game plan. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly. As you may know, we've been producing a lot of bonus episodes while under the influences on hiatus. They're called the Beatleology Interviews, where I talk to people who knew the Beatles, work with them, love them, and the authors who write about them. Well, the Beatleology Interviews have become a hit, so we are spinning it out to be a standalone podcast series. You've already heard conversations with people like actors Mark Hamill, Malcolm McDowell, and Beatles confidant Astrid Kershaw. But coming up, I talk to May Pang, who dated John Lennon in the mid-70s. I talk to double fantasy guitarist Earl Slick, Apple Records creative director John Kosh. I'll be talking to Jan Hayworth,

who designed the Sgt. Pepper album cover. Very cool. And I'll talk to singer Dion, who is one of only five people still alive who were on the Sgt. Pepper cover. And two of those people were Beatles. The stories they tell are amazing. So thank you for making this series such a success. And please do me a favor, follow the Beatleology interviews on your podcast app. You don't even have to be a huge Beatles fan. You just have to love storytelling. Subscribe now and don't miss a single beat. In case nobody's told you, weight loss goes beyond the old just eat less and move more narrative. And that's where Felix comes in. Felix is redefining weight loss for Canadians with a smarter, more personalized approach to help you crush your health goals this year.

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You're under the influence with Terry O'Reilly. I was once hired to direct an unusual radio campaign for Labatt Blue. The campaign theme was Out of the Blue, meaning spontaneous fun. The idea was to make spontaneous prank phone calls and record the results. We needed to find a performer who could handle those live phone calls. Someone fun, someone who could ad-lib, someone who could tease funny moments out of real people. We needed someone fearless. That's when I met Cameron Hughes. Welcome to Camel. How may I help you?

Hi, it's Cameron calling out of the blue. Do you clean rugs? Yes, we do. Oh, perfect. I was wondering if you'd clean my rug for me. Is it a loose rug? It's a loose rug. Okay, can you bring it in? I can bring it in, absolutely no problem. But I really need it tonight. I have a date.

But it takes five days. Five days? Yep. I'm going to be bald for five days? Bald, sir? Hey, I'm calling out of bald for five days? It, it, bald, sir? Hey, I'm calling out of the blue. You could be next. Labatt Blue.

Cam was perfect. He was funny, he was fast on his feet, and he had an uncanny ability to connect with real people. We did dozens of those commercials together. All real phone calls. It was one of the most successful radio campaigns BatBlue ever did. But voicing radio commercials wasn't Cam's main gig. His day job is crowd igniter. You see, Cam Hughes is hired by sports teams to get crowds all fired up. So somewhere in the second period of a low-energy hockey game, or during a lull in a long tennis match or a timeout at a basketball game, Cameron

Hughes will be sitting in the stands just like any fan, or he might be disguised as an usher, then all of a sudden he'll jump out of his seat and start dancing like a madman in the aisles. In no time, Cam has the entire stadium cheering. He ignited crowds at a total of 28 Las Vegas Golden Knights hockey games in their first amazing season. He has ignited crowds at the U.S. Open tennis tournament. Roger Federer stops to watch him. Novak Djokovic invited him down to center court for a dance-off. Cameron Hughes started becoming the most famous professional fan in sports 26 years ago. It began in his hometown of Ottawa during a Senators game. The crowd energy was low, so Cam just got up and started dancing.

At first, the fans wondered who this nut was. But before long, the cheering was so loud, it attracted the attention of the senator's management, who asked him to come back again. First, they gave him free tickets, then they paid him. And that was the start of a unique career. Cam is now hired by sports teams all over the world to create a unique crowd experience. And fans love him. They cheer, they dance, there is always a sea of cell phones filming his every move.

The energy level in the arena hits overdrive. He was just named the Best Sports Act of the Year, as determined by GamesOp.com, for the third year in a row. Award criteria? Drawing power, entertainment quality, added media exposure for the team, and act innovation. Cameron Hughes not only has a unique job, he has a singular gift. A rare ability to connect with 20,000 people at a time. He connects with them at minor league arenas, giant stadiums, hockey games, and NBA finals. He has performed for over 10 million fans in four countries.

Cameron Hughes creates memorable experiences. He puts fans in stands. Every sports team needs to put fans in the stands. And that's not an easy task. There is a lot of competition for entertainment dollars these days. Sports teams need an ever-evolving marketing strategy to keep selling tickets. And they can't count on a winning team. That means marketing becomes the other player on the roster. It all comes down to one critical thing.

Creating an experience that fans crave. You're under the influence. In Major League Baseball's opening month in 2018, there were 21 rainouts, the most in 12 years. But the obstacle to selling tickets is not always bad weather. Sometimes, it's hot weather. In other words, how do you sell hockey in the desert? Well, just ask the Las Vegas Golden Knights. The organization had a steep hill to climb.

Hockey was just not a part of the Las Vegas experience. And the team's owners had to put together a marketing plan before they even knew which players they had. To begin with, they created a team motto. Vegas Born. Rather than aim at the tourist trade, the team chose to aim at Las Vegas residents. And it caught on. Las Vegans, and yes, that's what you call local residents, started embracing the term. Every kid born in the main hospital there received a Vegas Born onesie.

The onesies were part of a long-term plan to create long-term fans. To do that, they had to get kids excited about hockey before the age of eight. The Golden Knights did that by partnering with 63 local schools. They taught PE teachers how to play street hockey. They supplied schools with equipment and lesson plans so it became part of the curriculum. The Knights also taught Vegas kids how to skate by creating a skating program that attracted 3,000 kids in its first year alone. The T-Mobile Arena where the Golden Knights play

was given a medieval theme, nicknamed the Fortress. An actual knight in full golden armor with a sword and shield skates around before the game, taunting the opposing team. An announcer leads a countdown. Then all the lights go out, and a sellout crowd

lights up the arena with glow sticks. It's an amazing sight. The team skates onto the ice through a 24-foot Knights helmet, while a line of 12 drummers plays them in. You know you have an incredible pregame show when the entire fan base shows up early so they don't miss it. The Knights organization was very aggressive in creating unique merchandise, putting a special emphasis on creating women's apparel. Very smart.

All of it a strategy to ignite intense fan interest for the first puck drop on October 2nd, 2017. But the day before the Las Vegas Golden Knights' very first game, tragedy hit. At least 58 people now dead. More than 500 people wounded in a horrific shooting on the Las Vegas Strip. It's the deadliest mass shooting in modern United States history. It was unimaginable horror. The Knights' management immediately donated over $200,000 to help the victims. A moving ceremony at the first game was dedicated to the first responders, management immediately donated over $200,000 to help the victims.

A moving ceremony at the first game was dedicated to the first responders, and all 58 names of the victims were projected onto the ice. All of this endeared the franchise to the community almost overnight. As the city started to heal over time, the most amazing thing happened. The Las Vegas Golden Knights started winning. And winning. And, as if in a Hollywood movie, the Knights made it all the way to the Stanley Cup Final. In their first year in the league.

It was historic. While they didn't win the Cup, they won hearts all over the nation. The attendance in the first season was actually 103%, counting standing room tickets. All 44 luxury suites were rented. Season's tickets sold out with a 2,500-person waiting list. Season 2 tickets sold out long before season one even ended. The Golden Knights now have the youngest, meaning most desirable, fans in the league. They sold the highest amount of jerseys in the NHL in their inaugural season and are in the top five for overall gate revenue. It is an amazing story. Great hockey mixed with smart marketing.

The Las Vegas Golden Knights are, by almost any measure, the most successful expansion team in the history of North American sports. All major sports teams have minor league farm teams. But what you may not know is that some very inventive and hilarious marketing goes on at the minor league level. Especially in baseball. Getting fans out to minor league games has always been challenging. And while those teams have limited budgets, they employ bold creativity. For example, the New York Mets are affiliated with a minor league team called the Binghamton Mets in

Binghamton, New York. There was a real lack of enthusiasm for the team in their hometown. So the owner of the minor league Mets decided to drum up interest by rebranding the team. He asked the town to suggest new names. The winning entry was the Binghamton Rumble Ponies. Believe it or not, there was some logic to that crazy name. Binghamton, New York is known as the carousel capital of the world. It is the biggest producer of horses for carousel rides. I kid you not. Hence, the Rumble Ponies.

That new name had an immediate effect on the town. Last year, the Binghamton Rumble Ponies had 15 rainouts, the most they've ever had in one year. But even with all those lost opportunities to sell tickets, the Rumble Ponies set a 10-year attendance record. Soon, other minor league teams took note. The San Antonio Missions, a double-A team affiliated with the San Diego Padres,

were moved to Amarillo, Texas last year. They are now known as the Amarillo Sod Poodles, which is slang for prairie dogs. When the Ottawa Lynx, a minor league team affiliated with the Philadelphia Phillies, moved to Allentown, Pennsylvania, their name was changed to the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs. The name comes from the pig iron manufactured in the area. The team wears bacon strips on its jerseys for Saturday night home games, and fans wear plastic pig noses.

The Mobile Bay Bears, a AA affiliate of the LA Angels, have been renamed the Rocket City Trash Pandas. Trash Panda is slang for raccoons in Alabama. If you think that's a loopy name, know this. The team did $500,000 in merchandise sales 30 days after the rebranding. The New Britain Red Sox, once affiliated with the Boston Red Sox, changed its name a couple of times before becoming the Hartford Yard Goats when the team was moved to Hartford, Connecticut. The stadium is across from the Hartford rail yards, and Yardgoats is slang for the tractors that shuffle train cars between different locomotives.

The Yardgoats' attendance this year was over 202,000, including 21 sellouts, setting a new attendance record. All of this rebranding ignited fan interest. And Ignite is a word the Chicago White Sox will never forget. And we'll be right back. If you're enjoying this episode, why not dip into our archives? Available wherever you download your pods. Go to terryoreilly.ca for a master episode list.

Back in July of 1979, the Chicago White Sox weren't having a good run. Mid-season, they were 35 wins with 45 losses. That night, they were playing a doubleheader with the Detroit Tigers, who were also having a losing season. Fan interest was low. So the son of the White Sox owner came up with an idea. Why not stage a disco demolition night? Disco was all the rage in 1979, but it was

starting to experience a backlash from diehard rock fans. So his idea was this. Bring a disco record to Comiskey Park and get into the doubleheader for only 98 cents. Then they'd blow up all the records in midfield. Now, a normal White Sox game might attract 16,000 fans. The owner hoped the disco demolition might pull in an additional 5,000. His math was a little off. Over 60,000 people showed up. Only 44,000 could fit into the park. So people started scaling the walls to get in.

They started rocking the ticket booths. It started to feel chaotic. When the first game of the doubleheader ended, a local DJ took to center field to whip the crowd into even more of a frenzy. Disco sucks! Disco sucks! Disco sucks! A giant box full of the disco records was hauled onto the field. Then, the big moment came.

The explosives were ignited. A thunderous boom shook the park. The explosion was a little bigger than everyone expected. It blew the records 30 feet into the air and tore a crater-sized hole in the field. Then, a fan ran onto the field and slid into second base. Seconds later, 7,000 fans stormed the field. The baseball players ran for cover. Fans were running the bases.

Then fans took the bases. They climbed the foul poles. They destroyed the batting cage. Meanwhile, a bonfire raged in the crater. Before long, the Chicago Riot Police burst through the gates on horseback. The field was so torn up and littered, the second game of the doubleheader was deemed unplayable. The White Sox had to forfeit the game to the Tigers. It was only the fourth forfeiture in modern MLB history.

Disco Demolition Night. Possibly the most infamous baseball promotion of all time. Demolitions aside, Minor League Baseball relies on promotions to fill the stands. The trick is to create an experience. That means creating theme nights that generate enough buzz to fill the stands over and over again. As one owner said, Minor League league baseball is like dinner theater. For example, the New Britain Rock Cats,

a AA affiliate of the Minnesota Twins, held a speed dating night. Eligible bachelors and bachelorettes change seats every inning to meet and chat. The Altoona Curve, an affiliate of the Pittsburgh Pirates, hosts awful nights where they try hard to give fans a terrible game experience. Fans are encouraged to wear awful clothes, the PA announcer mispronounces players opposite nights, where the scoreboard starts with the ninth inning and works its way down to the first.

The team wears their road uniforms at home, and players ask the fans for autographs. The Mahoning Valley Scrappers in Ohio, a team affiliated with the Cleveland Indians, held a contest to give away a free liposuction treatment. That same night was All You Can Eat Wednesday. The Charleston Riverdogs, affiliated with the New York Yankees, are one of the most creative minor league teams.

They actually held a silent night where talking and cheering was forbidden until the fifth inning. Fans had to hold up signs if they wanted to cheer or boo. The ushers were replaced with librarians. And if you think that's funny, the Riverdogs once held a nobody night. Fans were purposely locked out of the stadium until the fifth inning because the team wanted to set a world record for having an official zero attendance. It may sound crazy,

but these promotions kept fans coming back again and again. Bet MGM, authorized gaming partner of the NBA, has your back all season long. From tip-off to the final buzzer, you're always taken care of with the sportsbook born in Vegas. That's a feeling you can only get with BetMGM. And no matter your team, your favorite player, or your style, there's something every NBA fan will love about BetMGM. Download the app today and discover why BetMGM is your basketball home for the season. Raise your game to the next level this year with BetMGM, a sportsbook worth a slam dunk and authorized gaming partner of the NBA. BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older

to wager Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BitMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. When the Vancouver Grizzlies moved to Memphis in 2001, that left the Toronto Raptors as the only NBA team in Canada. The team tried to leverage that fact in its marketing. But the excitement around the Raptors had worn off.

The fans were disenfranchised. The brand was limping. 2015 would mark the 20th anniversary of the Raptors, and it provided an opportunity to rebrand the team. So in 2011, the Raptors' marketing department, led by Chief Marketing Officer Shannon Hosford, embarked on a four-year rebranding plan. To begin with, it invited advertising agencies to pitch the team on a brand new identity.

The assignment contained a big challenge. How do you turn a hockey country into a basketball nation? Hosford and her team had ambitious plans. The first goal was to put the Raptors back on the map nationally. Second goal, to attract a celebrity ambassador. Third, to attract the NBA's biggest event, the All-Star Game, to Toronto. And fourth, to put the Raptors on the map in the NBA. The ambassador goal clicked into place in 2013 when Toronto-based rapper Drake jumped on board.

When the notion was raised to try and bring the All-Star Game to Toronto, some didn't think it was possible, saying the game happens in February when the weather is freezing. Americans need passports to get to Toronto. No one would come. That pushback got the marketing department thinking. Winter runs through Canadian veins. It's part of our culture.

Yes, 29 of the 30 NBA teams are located in the U.S., but why can't we be proud of our geography instead of apologetic? Meanwhile, advertising agencies were pitching their rebranding ideas. One agency, called Sid Lee, unveiled an idea that was dramatically different from all the other agencies. The core idea was that Canadians were outsiders playing our own game. After all, basketball was invented by a Canadian. Sid Lee presented three simple words. That was it. The words were, We the North.

The Raptors organization loved it. The words were, We the North. The Raptors organization loved it. There was debate whether the line should be, We are the North, but the Sidley ad agency disagreed. They believed We the North sounded wrong in just the right way. They saw it as a declaration, like We the People. Sidley shot a 60-second video to launch the rebranding. Instead of actors, they put out a casting call for local basketball players. The video did not contain a single Canadian cliché. There were no Mounties, no moose, no mountains. Instead, it featured concrete playgrounds,

graffiti-covered back alleys, and gritty urban landscapes. The final shot of the video showed a black flag that said, We the North. Sid Lee tried filming the flag in the sunshine, but it had no impact. So, in the wee hours of the night, as the final shot of the video, they filmed the flag flapping in the cold air against a dark night sky. It was dramatic. While all this was going on, the Raptors made the playoffs for the first time in seven years.

So the video was rush released. We, the North, in many ways we're in a league of our own. One step removed, Just beyond the boundaries. Some would say we're on the outside looking in. But from our perspective, we're on the outside looking within. Because that's where the effort resides. Toughness is found. The aggression is tapped on the inside.

We're far from the east side. Miles from the west side. Nowhere near the south side. We are the north side. A territory all our own. And if that makes us outsiders, we're in. It was a manifesto. It caught on like a wildfire. Drake and Justin Bieber both retweeted it.

That generated 500,000 views in the first two days. Then, against all odds, Toronto won the bid to host the All-Star Game in 2016. With that, three of the Raptors' four massively ambitious goals were achieved. Now, only the biggest puzzle piece remained, putting the Raptors on the map in the NBA. Then came the historic 2019 season. And that's it. There's a new NBA champion, and it's a team from Toronto, Canada. We the North are now We the Champions. The Toronto Raptors won the NBA championship in a remarkable series against the seemingly invincible Golden State Warriors.

We the North thundered across not one, but two nations. With that, the final piece of the Raptors' audacious set of goals clicked into place. Marketing-wise, it was one of the biggest, most successful sports rebrandings in recent history. Because it wasn't just a marketing campaign. It was a revolution. When Cameron Hughes goes to work, he isn't looking at the players. He is fully focused on the fans.

That was the secret to the incredible We the North rallying cry. It wasn't only a rebranding of the Raptors. It was a flat out celebration of the fans. If that makes us outsiders, we're in. Never underestimate the power of a fan

base. Along with a very smart Raptor front office led by Masayu Jiri, We the North simply elevated Canadian fan pride, and the fans elevated the team. The Raptors are now the most valuable sports team in Canada. Unlike a touring rock star who sells tickets town to town, a sports team has to sell tickets in the same town over and over again.

It's no easy task. Hope can't be a strategy, and you can't count on a winning team. So we see speed dating nights, and the Rocket City Trash Pandas, and a brilliant strategy to bring hockey to the desert. On the other hand, we sometimes see liposuction nights, and the occasional mushroom cloud in the outfield. Not everything works. While a good matchup sells tickets, staging an incredible fan experience sells repeat tickets. That's the holy grail.

And that's why sports teams do everything they can to keep you under the influence. I'm Terry O'Reilly. This episode was recorded in the Terrastream Mobile Recording Studio. Producer Debbie O'Reilly. Sound Engineer, Keith Ullman. Theme music by Ari Posner and Ian Lefevre. Research, Patrick James Aslan.

If you liked this episode, you might also enjoy Super Bowl Advertising, Season 6, Episode 5. You'll find it in our archives wherever you download your podcasts. See you next week.