A-B Promo Catches Baseball Dreams; NBA Rolls Out Interactive Hoopla - Anheiser-Busch - Brief Article

Brandweek, April 9, 2001 by Hilary Cassidy

Anheuser-Busch will tap its partnership with Major League Baseball this year for an on-premise bar promotion giving fans the chance to live out their baseball fantasies, and a program that will provide contributions to Hispanic scholarship funds.

"Baseball is very important to us from a beer-selling standpoint," said Steve Uline, Anheuser-Busch's group director of sports marketing and Bud Sports, regarding the Budweiser Long Ball Challenge. Starting April 15, the baseball-themed arcade game will visit 16 markets, with five nights of promotion at a total of 10 accounts in each. The winning two-person team from each site will be awarded a baseball experience at their local ballpark, including taking batting practice, a clubhouse tour and meeting players. Fans also can enter a national sweepstakes to win a trip to the All-Star Game, with the same visit-to-the ballpark perks as the local prize. The promotion will be supported with local radio and in-stadium messages.

A-B also will participate in a season-long program called "Homerunanzo," donating $100 for every home run hit by 11 participating teams in their respective stadiums toward Hispanic scholarship funds. In addition, A-B will run general and All-Star-themed local promotions and provide team-specific POP for the 24 MLB teams it sponsors locally.

"This year will be the most aggressive [Anheuser-Busch] has ever been with Major League Baseball," said Tim Brosnan, MLB evp-business. "We've been very active in working with partners to understand who they want to reach through their baseball relationship and to build programs we think will reach their particular consumers."

Music and basketball will be the focus of the Yahoo! Sports NBA Rhythm 'n Rims tour starting April 21 in Miami. The tour will travel to 14 markets, including Dallas, New York, San Francisco and Atlanta, for two-day stays offering music and hoops.

An 18-wheel transforming vehicle will provide interactive basketball attractions as well as a concert stage where up-and-coming pop and R&B artists will perform. Current and former NBA and WNBA players will run clinics and sign autographs. Among the activities is the e-dunk area, where fans can create an image of themselves dunking and e-mail it to friends or make prints on Yahoo! Photos.

"This is core to our overall strategy of extending our brand offline in a meaningful way," said Mike Kelley, senior brand manager of Yahoo! Sports.

"Music is so relevant to our target audience and this gives us a great opportunity to combine two strong interests of the fans," said Ken Derrett, svp, global marketing partnerships, NBA.

Targeting teens and families, the tour will be supported via local radio and print ads, with local cable TV buys likely. Each ad will be tagged with a microsite, www.nba.yahoo.com, going live this week, where fans can get schedule information, purchase music from the tour artists, chat with players and musicians, and bid on autographed memorabilia, with proceeds going to NBA partner Reading Is Fundamental (RIF).

As the Vancouver Grizzlies seek approval to relocate to Memphis, where the bid has strong support from local corporate citizen Federal Express, up for debate is the question of whether the team can sell its naming rights to the premium delivery service and become the Memphis Express.

An NBA spokesman said, "'Express' as a nickname clearly violates our current procedures and our recommendation to the league owners is we not make any changes to our current procedures But sources indicate the league has not as yet totally nixed the idea.

A good lawyer could argue there is some precedent. According to the NBA Encyclopedia, the Sonics nickname was inspired by Seattle's Boeing plant. And, while from another era (1946), the Pistons were named after owner Fred Zollner's piston-making plant.

Still, it will be an uphill battle. David Stern has been the most protective of any league commissioner of his brand on-court--not even allowing the swoosh to appear on Nike-made uniforms--so allowing a corporate name would be a philosophical leap. And there is the issue of what to do with the next request: Does this open the door for the Hawks to sell their rights to Coke and become the Atlanta Sprites?