Some ideas to stimulate New Zealand rugby
Roar Rookie By Kevin Roberts, 24 Mar 2011 Kevin Roberts is a Roar Rookie
- Tagged:
- All Blacks, New Zealand Rugby Union, NZRU, Rugby Union
Since the professional era began, the New Zealand Rugby Union has been on top of the game. The All Blacks are an inexorable force that dominates world rugby. But the union is facing real financial pressures as a result of the globalization of the game and the subsequent exposure to foreign exchange and international broadcast rights.
Kevin Roberts is the Chair of USARFU
The NZRU needs to create some new revenue streams if it’s to be a sustainable force in future.
I’ve rustled up 15 ideas with a few multinational mates – Aussies, Kiwis, Americans and Brits – to help turn the accounts the same winning color as the jerseys: Black.
1. Re-frame rugby at every level as a real family, social option (one of the original Super 12 objectives).
Look at what Stade Francais are doing in Paris. Flowery team jerseys, massive social networking. We need to move Super 15 games closer to 20/20 Cricket, NBA matches and pop concerts.
The Wellington Sevens is a brilliant example of a festival spirit. Lots of fun around the game, not just because of it. Entice. Reward. Repeat.
2. Develop a super-amped global All Blacks community.
With real intimate, exclusive contact. Behind the scenes stuff. Dressing room/training ground banter. Player proper truthful post-match analysis.
Training tips. Personal stuff from players/coaches. Lots of social networking around games/tours. A global, premium social network of rugby people interacting around the AB’s. 250,000 members x $74 = $18.75 million!
A great gift for your son/dad/mate.
3. Build the global brand, especially in emerging markets.
The All Blacks are the number one brand in world rugby and one of the top sports brands in the world.
We need to deepen and broaden our fan base geographically in a similar way to what ManU has done in China, Chelsea in Africa, the Lakers and the Yankees globally, opening the door for sales of merchandise, videos and training materials.
4. Develop an All Blacks training, fitness and leadership programme.
On-line. Off-line. For individuals and corporates. Relevant to sports teams in all sports, university teams especially China and businesses everywhere. Combine leadership, great stories, amazing video, hands-on coaching, skills, decision-making etc etc.
Aim to be the number one programme globally.
5. Host an NZRU school sports tournament every year.
Different age groups. All Black participation in training and leadership (old players). Sub contract to sports tour specialists.
6. Play more Sevens at School/Club level.
This will increase participation levels, attract new audience demographics, generate new sponsorship opportunities, increase player athleticism, win over mums as violence/ injuries reduce … and increase our Olympic Gold medal count!
7. Bring on the Women.
Include female Board members at every level of the game. Get their voices heard. We need to get all New Zealand women believing once again that rugby is the game for all New Zealanders.
We must listen to them and address their concerns. And we must revitalize funding for our World Champion Black Ferns. More Olympic golds. More world championships. And more sponsorship opportunities.
8. Ensure every seat is sold for every Test match.
Make it unforgiveable for a stadium manager to have an unsold seat at an All Blacks Test match. The GFC is blamed for a drop-off in ticket sales, but it’s equally arguable that poor selling techniques have been used. Test match revenue is core.
NZRU must have a ‘no seat left behind’ attitude.
9. Follow the British example and invest in one 80,000 seater home pitch stadium in Auckland
It should have a huge naming rights sponsor. Play all our big tests there and ensure there are stacks of high price corporate boxes, and special new, low cost family seating.
10. The First XV.
15 lifelong debentures that pass from father to sibling or back to the NZRU. Access to all areas (equal to NZRU chairman), special access to team/sponsor events, hotels/training, and one annual dressing room visit. Super, super exclusive. $1 million each.
11. Offer corporations individual player sponsorships. 45 players at different options. Five days work per player per sponsor, split 50:50 player and NZRU. A $2 million annual return.
12. Change the model of game revenue distribution. We get hammered fiscally on the November Tour. We get the glory. The British get the money. The crowds come to see the All Blacks.
The Number One ranked team in the world. The most entertaining team in the world. The team everyone wants to beat. We need a new revenue sharing model.
13. Appoint the world’s best foreign exchange managers.
Significant elements of NZRU’s profit/loss scenarios comprise management of foreign exchange. NZRU need to ensure they have the Goldman Sachs of foreign exchange on their team.
14. Bring on the Women (again!).
If women make 80% of the purchasing decisions, why then is NZ rugby a women-free zone? The Black Ferns are the best in the world, there are some very capable women commentators, and we see in the US how much the game can be enjoyed by young women because of its physicality. Women are so often the enablers of rugby, making space for the kids to go and practice and play.
Making space for women makes sense for broadening viewership – broadcast revenue is the largest contributor to the pie. Making the game more involving for women (imagine women referees!) broadens the audience.
15. Get famous by committing to film.
Get inside the AB’s heads, their training; the AB’s in Camp a must-watch programme for NFL, NBA, Premiership etc players. This is the serious business of being the best team in the history of world sports. For other elite sports, coaches and teams to learn from.
New Zealand/New York-based Kevin Roberts is the CEO Worldwide of Saatchi & Saatchi, one of the world’s leading creative organizations, with a team of 6000 people in 140 offices across 80 countries. He is the author of Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands (powerHouse Books, 2004) Lovemarks is translated into 17 languages worldwide
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March 24th 2011 @ 4:55am
CizzyRascal said | March 24th 2011 @ 4:55am | Report comment
Very interesting article and pertinent at the moment.
Some of the stuff is a little over my head, but points one and fifteen would certainly gain my support.
March 24th 2011 @ 5:55am
A Hack said | March 24th 2011 @ 5:55am | Report comment
I am sure the NZRFU is very grateful. A saturated market where the sport is No. 1 by a distance.
Perhaps a RWC in the Autumn – oh they have that already errr…
Not sure I need to be David Ogilvy or Leo Burnett in this instance.
So great marketing sage any material ideas for USA rugby?
Pause.
Slightly trickier brief I’d say Mr Roberts. How is that getting on?
Scary thing is people pay 7 figures for this stuff.
March 24th 2011 @ 9:20pm
allblackfan said | March 24th 2011 @ 9:20pm | Report comment
marketing US rugby is taking off, thank you. NBC showed the Las Vegas Sevens live prime time and will show all the RWC games live into the US primetime.
Which is more than you can say about rugby and FTA in Australia!!
March 24th 2011 @ 6:40am
Jerry said | March 24th 2011 @ 6:40am | Report comment
Some of those ideas are awful.
Play all the big tests in Auckland? Great idea – alienate 3/4′s of the country.
Make rugby even more commercial? Great. I already skip the 7′s cause it’s got sod all to do with what happens on the pitch. Here’s something that I think would get more people going to Super Rugby. Play a curtain raiser. That ends 10 minutes before kick off – maybe, just maybe, people who watch rugby might want to see a game of rugby for pre-match entertainment instead of some washed up singer or covers band? And go easy on the fucking music during the match!!
Others aren’t realistic – the NZRU has been trying to implement a different revenue sharing system for years, but the 6 Nations sides have absolutely no reason to change the current model, and they’ve got enough votes to ensure they don’t have to.
March 24th 2011 @ 7:42am
Football United said | March 24th 2011 @ 7:42am | Report comment
its not a silly idea at all. Eden Park is way to small, it really is an injustice that its hosting a cup final when it only holds 50 000. most countries have all their games at their national stadium and it works well for them because they still draw big crowds from round the country. New Zealand is small enough size wise to do this while Australia say isn’t.
Rugby Nations with National Stadiums
England – Twickenham
Wales -millenium Stadium
Ireland – Aviva Stadium
Scotland – Murrayfield
France – Stade de France
Argentina – Estadio José Amalfitani
March 24th 2011 @ 7:47am
CizzyRascal said | March 24th 2011 @ 7:47am | Report comment
Argentina don’t have all their games in the one place. They move around.
Also, the first 5 all have stadiums where people don’t have to get a plane just to be able to get to the match.
March 24th 2011 @ 7:49am
katzilla said | March 24th 2011 @ 7:49am | Report comment
France don’t play every game at Stade de France, we played them in Marseille 2009
It works in the home nations because its merely a drive away of a couple of hours to attend a game for most fans.
Even to attend an away game against Wales isn’t that much of a drive for English.
But for a Fan from Invercargil to attend an All Blacks match in Auckland? Well your pretty much cutting the common man out of the loop because no one in their right mind is going to make that drive.
March 24th 2011 @ 5:34pm
Jerry said | March 24th 2011 @ 5:34pm | Report comment
It’s gonna hold 60,000 for the final Football.
Are you a kiwi? I’m guessing not, or you’d understand that people from about Waikato down would see it as yet another example of rugby becoming more about $ and less about tradition.
March 24th 2011 @ 1:14pm
Wu said | March 24th 2011 @ 1:14pm | Report comment
Nice point about the music Jerry, I immensely dislike hearing Black Eyed Peas or Rihanna at a game. It detracts from the authenticity of true rugby match experience. Unions (i.e. club, state or provincial) should direct their resources toward building a supporters culture unique to their own club, state or province. There is nothing like hearing hundreds/or thousands sing in unison. If anything that is what captivates a rugby union speculator. Well more so then hearing Will.I.Am say “pump it! louder”. That’s so cheesy and has nothing to do with the soul of rugby.
March 24th 2011 @ 7:35am
katzilla said | March 24th 2011 @ 7:35am | Report comment
Im sure the sponsorship model could be tweaked a bit, but I’m not sure on some of the others.
Some of them seem like pie in the sky stuff without any real indication of whether or not they’re actually possible.
Did someone get hold of your Brainstorming drafts?
The ‘All big games in Auckland’ would never work, and how would you propose to sell every seat for every test match?
Jaffas have enough problems with Saturation as it is, if you played every match there it’d be almost impossible to fill an 80k stadium for every test. Unless you sell the tickets at $10 a pop, but then your cheapening the brand.
March 24th 2011 @ 7:48am
bruski said | March 24th 2011 @ 7:48am | Report comment
Does New Zealand have their own Roar? Would have been better to post this the other side of the Ditch because frankly it is a non-issue to me
March 24th 2011 @ 12:25pm
MR said | March 24th 2011 @ 12:25pm | Report comment
Bruski, great comments, perhaps we should clearly state that Roar is only to be used by australians for australians and get rid of those pesky non dinky rinky true blue aussies… in fact why dont we have have an automatic editor that bans any mention of any team or player that is not Australian…
March 24th 2011 @ 8:27am
stillmissit said | March 24th 2011 @ 8:27am | Report comment
It is a great initiative just don’t tell the AB’s. I am sick to death of the last 10 years of TN and BC anguish.
Lets pretend they are not there? If we put our heads under the sheets long enough they will go bankrupt and then they won’t ruin our sleep anymore.
March 24th 2011 @ 3:37pm
sixo_clock said | March 24th 2011 @ 3:37pm | Report comment
All Black bedding material, I think you are onto something! Why stop there, homeware, cookware, BBQs, condoms, relaxation music (the Haka sung slowly by nuns), computers (Apple needs some competition), white goods (they only come in one colour – black).
For us, the opposition, dartboards with replaceable faces. Whose face will sell the most – mmm?
March 24th 2011 @ 8:41am
MattyP said | March 24th 2011 @ 8:41am | Report comment
So your number 1 idea to market the All Blacks is to make their games more like US sporting events?
No thanks. Better product, less packaging please.
March 24th 2011 @ 8:54am
Brett McKay said | March 24th 2011 @ 8:54am | Report comment
1, 8, and 12 are very good ideas, that the broader SANZAR community should look at now anyway. But on 8, how many Tests in NZ have NOT been sell-outs in recent years??
March 24th 2011 @ 8:57am
Geoff Brisbane said | March 24th 2011 @ 8:57am | Report comment
How about making their supporters wear a bit less expensive. Went to Rebel sport to buy (another) All Black jersey and it was $150 and none available (Mt Gravatt, Brisbane) and the Wallaby jersey was like $40 cheaper. Are you sure the NZRU are cash strapped or is it also the ARU and the SARFU??? compared to the NH teams.
Don’t cheapen the product by watering it down (like beer). Make it less available and charge more (like gold).
If the All Blacks or Wallabies or Boks were to tour and play less often and in key strategic locations could that be an option.
6N play each other once per year, last year the BOKS v All Blacks and Wallabies x3 each and the Wallabies v All Blacks x 4 bit of an over exposure don’t ya think. The gap for when the All Blacks played in Brisbane was something like 6 or 7 years (about 5 years ago) now within the 5 year period they will have been here 3 out of 5.
March 24th 2011 @ 1:26pm
Wu said | March 24th 2011 @ 1:26pm | Report comment
“Geoff Brisbane – Don’t cheapen the product by watering it down (like beer). Make it less available and charge more (like gold)”
I got your back on that one Geoff. Scale back the amount of tests that countries play and the appetite of the masses will become all-consuming. Once tickets to a test match go on sale they will be devoured in minutes/hours. It’s simple economics really.
Kevin Roberts – Point 1: The Wellington Sevens is a brilliant example of a festival spirit. Lots of fun around the game, not just because of it.
Forget the festival atmosphere around the match…it should be all about the match…that other stuff is just a bonus. If we commercialize and Americanize the game, there will be no turning back.
March 24th 2011 @ 9:03am
Fivehole said | March 24th 2011 @ 9:03am | Report comment
Some good ideas, but mostly marketing rubbish.
7′s is definitely not the way forward for the game.
March 24th 2011 @ 11:10am
GrecoGuy said | March 24th 2011 @ 11:10am | Report comment
“7′s is definitely not the way forward for the game.”
Maybe you should expand upon this and submit it as an article to provoke some discussion on the topic. I’m being sincere here – this is not a dig at you. The general feeling is that 7′s is the formula for increasing the game’s footprint globally. Why do you think it’s not the way forward? Or are you just referring to NZ in this instance?