Title: CEO, Relay Sports and Event Marketing
Recent interesting deal: “First, Hallmark. We negotiated one of the leading partnership agreements with the United States Olympic Committee, which marked Hallmark’s first major sponsorship in history. The deal included eight brand categories and 24 licensed products. Hallmark’s activation plan to support their investment in the Winter Olympic Games is a great example of `It’s not what you buy, it’s what you do with it that matters.’ For example, they’ve created ownable marketing platforms within the Games.
“Hallmark designed the official gold, silver and bronze medal bouquets that all athletes will receive, and we will also have Hallmark-branded flowers outside Olympic Medals Plaza for fans to purchase.
“The second deal was the creation of the U.S. Army All-American Bowl, featuring the top 75 high school football seniors in the country, from San Antonio, Texas, airing live on ESPN2 Jan. 5. The Army understands the importance of providing positive outlets for high school student-athletes, and the U.S. Army All-American Bowl is a door-opening opportunity that empowers student-athletes to succeed.”
The next big thing: “The opportunity for Fortune 500 companies to take their national and global sports, event and entertainment sponsorships and make them relevant at the grass-roots level.
“From a sports marketing perspective, we believe collegiate sports events present incredible opportunities for clients to tap into core `passion groups’ and create meaningful connections between brands and consumers.”
Is there anything you wish you had bought more of? “I wish more clients would have supported was the 1999 Women’s World Cup event in the U.S. We were fortunate to have our client, Allstate, take a risk with us to develop a fully integrated marketing plan to activate our sponsorship of the WWC. While other big corporate clients stayed on the sidelines, Allstate incorporated its sponsorship into the company’s overall marketing plans. Allstate bought into the event a year prior to the games and embraced its WWC sponsorship wholeheartedly. As a result, the company was able to see a huge return on its investment.”
If you weren’t in media buying: “The only thing I would enjoy more than my current position is becoming the owner of the Chicago Bears and the Chicago Cubs. ”