Comments on: The MLL Sponsorship Question Persists

By: BG

BG — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 06:52:00 +0000

The guy in black is Benji Marshall who plays for the Penrith Panthers. He’s also the captain of the New Zealand rugby league team.

By: Asdf

Asdf — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 14:15:00 +0000

Considering that Dave Morrow owns Warrior and co-founded the MLL, why would anyone think that he’d allow Nike or other equipment companies into the league? I can buy the idea of allowing other companies in, but asking Morrow to allow his competitors into the league ain’t gonna happen. I’m definitely no fan of Morrow, but I’ve seen how he does things for years now, and he’s not interested in raising the cow, he just want to milk it dry.

By: Adam Edg

Adam Edg — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 12:43:00 +0000

Found this article this morning: http://www.goal.com/en-us/news/1110/major-league-soccer/2011/04/25/2458359/business-off-the-pitch-advantages-of-competition-between-kit

By: Jbennett

Jbennett — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 02:30:00 +0000

Love the idea and would allow teams to take advantage of corporate sponsors in their own backyards and to branch outside of the current or traditional lacrosse sponsors to form synergistic relationships with companies in the beverage industry, health food industry, and shipping industry to name a few. For example, a team in Memphis could partner with FedEx and name the team the Express. A team in Cincinnati could partner with Proctor and Gamble and name the team the Tide, and so on. Moreover, beyond allowing MLL teams to secure their own sponsors also allowing those teams to advertise on their uniforms and team related marketing materials (within limits, its not NASCAR) to provide additional revenue dollars. Why should the MLL self constrict themselves, the MLL needs to find Blue Oceans to drive sustainable growth.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 21:22:00 +0000

ah, but is that sustainable? The MLL needs to be on a 20 year plan. From here. And they’re 11 years in already!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 21:22:00 +0000

I like it!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 18:57:00 +0000

I agree with the majority of the article and I’ve been adding comments with a similar stance for the past few weeks. The only thing that (IMO) should change in the above is that having each team try to obtain lax-based equipment manufacturer sponsorships is short sighted. 1) I believe it takes away from the motivation of Warrior/NB to continue to dump major dolloars into the league. And 2) targeting these groups is really small potatoes; the whole point is that there isn’t a ton of money (yet) to be made by these lax manufacturers in the lacrosse specific arena. Meaning Nike is loaded but they’re not making that much off lacrosse and not enough to justify a major and competeting (with Warrior/NB) sponsoship in the MLL.

The better way to handle this, and it’s perfectly evident if you look closely at the pics above, is to get major non-lacrosse companies to sponsor individual teams. Note that there aren’t rugby or athletic sponsors pasted on any of those unis. You instead see things like cell phone companies, computer and software companies, car companies, etc. These companies may be a harder sell (they don’t know and love lax like we do) but this provides an opportuniry for them to reach out to a new market. And, they’re not competing with the founding sponsor of the league.

By: Laxfan0

Laxfan0 — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 18:51:00 +0000

Only if the team gets more than they would get from a league wide deal. So you would be willing to turn down a lot of guaranteed $ for the hopes that you get more from somewhere else? I wouldn’t.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:39:00 +0000

More cash may not be available in the US. Thats why foreign companies may be willing to invest i.e. Australia. Have a current account surplus, lower inflation that US, and lower unemployment. The Aussies have cash to burn at the moment

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:38:00 +0000

More money to market the sport in your area. Not necessarily a definite that more fans will come but frees up cash to invest back into the local fan base

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:30:00 +0000

fixed. thanks D_C!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:29:00 +0000

that’s what I’M saying, LDT! There just isn’t all this extra money laying about… the pool is, like you say, limited for now. By buying and writing maybe WE can increase this pool. Great comment.

By: Laxfan0

Laxfan0 — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:29:00 +0000

Someone tell me how more sponsors = more fans?

By: Luscious Dick Tacoma

Luscious Dick Tacoma — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:25:00 +0000

People are acting as if there’s a massive, massive pool of loose cash hanging around businesses these days that’s just begging to be used as advertising instead of, say, operational costs.

Sponsorship needs, first of all, to prove to be a necessary cost of the sponsor’s business. As necessary as any other of their costs of business, including salaries.

Here’s how to do that.

Step 1: On your current favorite team (that has a sponsorship), BUY SOMETHING FROM THE SPONSOR.
Step 2: Write the sponsor, call the sponsor, let the sponsor know that the reason you bought the item is because they sponsored your favorite team.
Step 3: Repeat until a) more sponsorships happen, or the b) sponsor drops your team.
Step 4: In the case of 3a, repeat steps 1-3. In the case of 3b, stop buying the sponsor’s product, and write/call/etc them and let them know that you stopped buying their product because they gave up the sponsorship.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:21:00 +0000

The idea of individual team sponsorships killing the MLL is a non-issue, as all that would be needed to be done to counteract it is to continue to follow the trends of rugby and football (soccer) over here and in other countries, in having an individual league sponsor as well. The English Premier League is actually the ‘Barclays Premier League’, the English rugby premiership is the ‘Aviva Premiership’, and so on with countless other leagues. Lower football teams pick up less prestigious sponsorships, with less lucrative deals, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that the teams fold. I appreciate that the situation is different with the immense popularity and stable tradition of football, but I don’t think it would be too much of a worry that teams would start to fold, after all, it would be their choice what sponsorships to take on and their responsibility to attract what they could. Some teams, often in less watched European football leagues from countries such as Sweden and Denmark, have multiple sponsors all taking up positions on the front of their shirts, a possibility to keep enough money coming in.

*Liverpool pack Anfield, their stadium; Stanley Park is the name of a proposed stadium that they have not actually been given the decision to go ahead and build yet, nor have they decided whether they want to or would instead just redevelop Anfield!