Sponsorship Review... Miller Park
Friday, April 11, 2008 at 06:05PM
Brian Gainor in Partnership Ideas

miller%20park.jpgSponsorship Review: Milwaukee Brewers, Miller Park

Milwaukee Brewers vs. Cincinnati Reds (4.8.2008 – 7:00pm)


The Top 10 Takeaways

1. The three (3) best sponsorship activation tactics at Miller Park were all nontraditional. Capitalize on interactive, engaging areas/elements of the fan experience

2. Properties and Teams need to collaborate to create LED that features a simple message with lettering that contrasts a bold background. From a fan’s viewpoint, keep messaging simple, yet relevant and understandable. Miller Park "best practices" included:

3. Old LED/Rotational Signage is Bad Signage – Make Parties Aware If You Are Selling The Old Stuff

4. Provide Promotional Winners with Prizes/Rewards of High Perceived Value

5. If you are going to use signage to drive web traffic (i.e. WhyTundra.com, WisconsinDrivesChevy.com), make it intriguing and appealing to the average fan attending the game

There is an opportunity to create value out of every area of the stadium

7. In the majority of professional stadium environments, there is no such thing as exclusivity anymore… Yes, you may have category exclusivity, but when 60+ brands are trying to push their messaging to fans in attendance, it is easy to get lost amongst the clutter

8. Miller Park features a very unique tailgate party scene in huge parking lots outside of the stadium… Why aren’t there any sponsors targeting these individuals pre-game? This would be a great atmosphere for hot dog/brat/beer/grill companies and sporting goods retailers to do some guerilla marketing

9. When sponsoring an organization, know the exact fan demographic profiles and customize your messaging to fit this segment (this is more difficult for some organizations than others)

10. Music is one of the most underutilized elements of the stadium experience. So often, music captures the attention of fans (signaling pitching changes, breaks in the game, stirring up fan excitement, player introductions), yet there really was no corporate integration here (outside of the US Cellular Ringtone of the game)…

Corporate Branding in Miller Park (From the Fan’s Viewpoint)

Promotions / Interactive Elements

Klement's Sausage Race (supported with left video board branding, LED Ribbon Board, etc.) - Occurs during the middle of the sixth (6th) inning Grade: A Notes: The Sausage Race is a stand-alone promotion; one of the best in-game features in all of sports…However, Klement’s needs to develop more direct measures to ensure that fans know that the feature is “Klement’s Sausage Race” and not “The Sausage Race”…

Midwest Airlines "Best Care Seats" - Two (2) lucky fans were awarded with premium seats; Midwest Airlines then gave their "signature cookies" to a randomly selected row in the stadium Grade: C Notes: Midwest Airlines did not come up with any out-of-the-box ideas here, but having back-to-back features (Best Care Seats and Lucky Cookie Row) accounted for a good amount of visibility early… However early is the key word here – these promotions, which took place in the early innings, were easily forgettable by the end of the game (Midwest Airlines had no signage/elements to support). Why doesn’t Midwest Airlines do something that analogizes a Home Run “Flight Time” or use a Midwest Airlines plane to drop coupons in the crowd, etc… Leaving the stadium, I didn’t know anything more about Midwest Airlines’ service, price, flight patterns, website, etc. outside of the fact that they offer cookies…

Valvoline Instant Oil Change (A Video Board Promotion that rewarded a fan driving a PT Cruiser Pre-Game with a Free Oil Change) Grade: B Notes: Valvoline’s Instant Oil Change video board (which was a parking lot feature) instantly puts the fans minds back in the parking lot (thinking about their car in the lot, driving home, etc.) so it was a great awareness driver… However, the details of how the winner was selected and the prize at hand, made it difficult to get excited about this promotion… How many people would go home and tell their friends that they saw a guy win a Free Oil Change? How about “Free Oil Changes for a Year?”… The promotion lacks some excitement that will keep them looking forward to it the next time they return to the ballpark…

Valvoline Junior Announcer – Valvoline featured a young child announcing player names during an inning Grade: D Notes: This in-game feature was shown immediately on the video board after the Oil Change Promotion… This “feel good” element with a distracting young child reading players names makes fans in-stadium quickly forget that the company just gave away a free oil change… Maybe it was a bad selected contestant, but this feature was more annoying than intriguing in every possible way.

Miller Lite Party Section (approx. 2nd or 3rd inning - Miller gave out balloons and fun party items to one select section) Grade: B Notes: The Miller Lite Party section was your typical “Fun Fan Section”, where the Brew Crew distributed balloons and some other items… There were no ties to Miller Lite and its difficult to see the correlation between Miller’s target consumer (Males 21-29) and the initiative they ran that seemed more family oriented (although it supports an enhancement of the fan experience at Miller Park

Road Runner Triple Play Trivia (winner received one free month of Internet service) Grade: F Notes: Time Warner ran a trivia question promotion that had no real tie-in to their services (cable, digital) and rewarded the contestant with one (1) free month of Internet service (which lacks a high perceived value)… Time Warner has a number of unique ways they can leverage their offerings, yet they came up very short on this one. Why not drive fans online with a unique promotion, offer, and/or select Brewer channel offerings?

Palmoro Pizza Toss - The contestant held a pizza on the field level and had to try to catch falling fake pizza's from the mascot standing high above on the slide Grade: B Notes: The foundation of Palmoro’s promotion is excellent: a child tries to catch falling pizza’s with one large pizza… Unfortunately this promotion took place in deep left center field (to integrate the mascot), which made it very difficult for 80% of the fans in the stadium to see outside of what was shown on the video board. Palmoro is on to something great here, they just need to look to expand the impact and visibility of the promotion

Valvoline Gameday Promotion - The first 20,000 fans entering the stadium received an exclusive coupon Grade: C Notes: Valvoline had a standard giveaway promotion for the first 20,000 fans entering the stadium… However, the in-game messaging for the promotion was not specific at all (messaging: “an exclusive coupon”). There could have been better in-game messaging to support and drive awareness of the promotion

Wisconsin Lottery "Guess the Attendance" – This was a video board feature that asked fans to guess the number of fans in attendance (your typical attendance promotion) – Grade C Notes: There really wasn’t a great tie-in to the Wisconsin Lottery outside of the fact that people were picking numbers… The fan did not reward the crowd or any selected contestants for guessing correctly… Why doesn’t the Lottery feature a vignette on the video board with five balls (resembling Power Ball) and reward a person with an exclusive prize based on spinning balls (the first three numbers represent the section #, the fourth ball represents the row, and the fifth ball represents the individual seat)… The Wisconsin Lottery could team up with Midwest Airlines to offer the lucky contestant a free away trip with the team

Briggs & Stratton Trivia Question (Beginning of the 6th Inning) – This was your standard trivia question… A dry feature; I couldn’t tell you what the question even asked… Grade D Notes: There can only be so many trivia question features in one game… I hope they received a discount on this… What is Briggs & Stratton? How does a trivia question enhance my thoughts of this company outside of the fact that I now know they exist? Hopefully driving brand awareness was their only objective with this promotion…

U.S. Cellular "Guess the Ringtone" and Win a Trip to Spring Training – Grade B Notes: This is your standard ringtone feature, which I would have graded a C, however, U.S. Cellular did a great job capturing fan attention by promoting the fact that the winner would have a chance to win a trip with the team to Spring Training (a VIP experience that fans cannot buy)… This moved it up a notch.

Potowami Crazy Cap Shuffle – The winner of the promotion won a dinner for three (3) at the Potowami Casino Resort if they correctly guessed which hat the item was under – Grade: B This promotion was an effective awareness driver for Potowami's casino-related services (restaurants, etc.). Potowami did a great job weaving this in to offer a nice reward.

Other In-Game Messaging / Branding

Upcoming Promotions

Ribbon Board LED Signage (4'Hx1,000'L)

Branded Stadium Sections

Upper Outfield Signage (Includes Video Board)

Lower Outfield Signage (Warning Track Signage and Lower Outfield Signage)

Right Field Rotational Signage (60'x3')

3rd Base Line (35'x3')

Other Signage

Non-Branded Game Elements

Unique Elements of the Miller Park Experience (Built in 2001)

  1. The Sausage Race
  2. Normal Wave... Turns Into Slow Wave...Turns into Extremely Fast Wave...
  3. "Shout" by Tears for Fears was played during a late inning pitching change (I had never heard this at a game and liked it)
  4. Bernie the mascot stays perched on the slide away from fans ALL game
  5. CITGO Meter
  6. Brats, Cheese Curds, "Secret Sauce", Miller Chill sold at the games, an easy place to rack up an $80 tab (or in our case, $79.75) in one concessions order
  7. $8 general parking (not a stone's throw from the ballpark), $15 premium parking (which should be general parking)
  8. The "Beer Barrel Polka" (which no one seems to know) immediately follows the singing of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” during the 7th Inning Stretch
  9. The size of the stadium is amazing... It rivals that of the Arizona Diamondback's Chase Field
  10. A thunderous retractable roof
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