Для тех людей у которых проблемы с Инглишем или же просто лень читать:Руководство НХЛ хочет начать все с нуля.Новая экономическая система,новая стратегия маркетинга игры,новые правила,новые технологии показа матчей.By Derrick Goold
Of the Post-Dispatch
Saturday, Dec. 18 2004
When the puck next drops on a National Hockey League season, the sport plans to
regain its lost traction by taking a Zamboni to all the scars caused by the
ongoing labor quagmire, undoing the erosion of a free-skating style and
starting again with what every game needs: A clean sheet.
Planning a sweeping and massive campaign to reinvent the game and its image,the NHL hopes to take advantage of the convergence of events to aggressively reassert itself after coming out of the work stoppage. Commissioner Gary Bettman calls it a "re-launch of the league", with no hint of exaggeration. New rules. New finances. New TV. New Reebok sweaters. New look. New outlook.
New NHL.
"The NHL right now is a league in peril - it either fixes it's problems right
now or its long-term future is in question," said Dean Bonham, head of The
Bonham Group, a Denver-based sports marketing firm that has done market research for the league. "It's not often that you have an opportunity tore-launch a league. . . . In my opinion, what you have to do is present the league in a new light. It's a new era of stability. A new era of fanappreciation. A new era of technology.
"It can be an attractive and popular sport in this new era."
But it won't be easy.
The league's plan - casually called the "re-launch" around the NHL offices -
has two main elements: Off ice and on it. Off ice, the NHL plans to roll out a new look and thematic "branding," including integrating new corporate sponsors,interactive events and new media. Having a shiny new collective bargaining agreement will also be trumpeted because the league hopes it comes with stability for its franchises. This past week the two sides rejected proposals,negotiations have frozen and no new meetings are scheduled.
On the ice, the plan is to rekindle a fleeter, more offensive game.
Lessons learned from other leagues as they emerged from labor disputes havebeen studied, as has the fact that much stronger leagues than the NHL have had ingering effects after stoppages. Basketball sprinted out of its 1998-99 work stoppage initially, but years later ratings and attendance still had a sag.Baseball only recently saw attendance nibble at the height of the pre-1994 strike.
Montreal never recovered and Toronto has struggled. It's a cautionary anecdote because parallels between the two Canadian cities with America's game and a few American cities with Canada's game are easy to draw. Plus, the NBA recovered quickly after missing the first half of its season. Baseball lumbered after losing its championship.
There's no precedent for a league missing a whole season.
"I think the impact will be dramatic for the NHL, more dramatic than baseball -
and it took 10 years for baseball to come back," said Toronto attorney Gordon
Kirke, a sports professor in Canada, lawyer for several NHL players and part of
the pursuit of the expansion Blue Jays. "Baseball wasn't new to any of the
markets. It was really ingrained in the people, in the cultural fabric of every
city it was in. Calling hockey part of the cultural fabric in every city of the
NHL has become more remote.
"Because hockey is not ingrained some people may forget it or don't feel that
sense of loyalty that comes with growing up playing it," Kirke continued.
"Baseball took that long to come back. How will hockey come back? It makes you
stop and wonder."
Ten years ago the NHL was billed by Sports Illustrated as the next hip sport,
poised to overtake the NBA. That next fall, the NHL endured a 103-day lockout.
Then came a glowing puck. Then came a clutch-and-grab defensive style. Then
lower scoring.
Attendance hasn't waned and revenue climbs, though ever slower according to the
league. This past spring the NHL All-Star Game drew a TV rating of 1.8, less
than the 2.1 rating the Arena Football League grabbed on its opening weekend.
NASCAR, golf and poker have leapfrogged slumbering hockey. The league's claim
to being the fourth major sport is annually bogged down by modifiers.
It's the fourth major team sport.
It's the fourth major team sport in North America.
"I'm pretty concerned right now where we are headed," said Blues defenseman
Eric Weinrich, once a player representative with the NHL Players' Association.
"If we miss the whole season, we go right back to Square one. If the league
tries to come back (in the fall) with scab players, it's going to be a
disaster. The whole thing could explode."
"We are very cognizant of the fact that the fans will have been through a lot,"
said Ed Horne, the president of NHL enterprises who is overseeing the
multi-pronged "re-launch". "We are not so naive to think there won't be a lot
of frustration and that it will take a lot to maintain our core fans and work
to (grow) the game."
"There's a problem"
In telephone polls of avid hockey fans conducted at the behest of the NHL, The
Bonham Group found that those fans "recognize there's a problem" with the
league and "are willing to wait." They said they would come back, Bonham said.
Hockey is widely regarded as a core-audience sport - devoted, rabid fans that
will always be devoted, rabid fans.
But not so many fringe or leisure fans.
When asked how the league could reclaim the momentum it once had and expand its
fan pool while retaining its base, Bonham pulls out his three-part plan for
stability and growth:
A new collective bargaining agreement that ensures financial
steadiness, be that through the league's cost-fixed link system or the
union's market-reset proposal.
Harnessing technology - primarily the advent of high-definition TV -
to help the league bloom beyond a "ticket-centric" economy. Having a game freed
up by new rules to display on high-tech TV would help. Also using similar means
to promote the players and league more extensively.
A "rollback or at the minimum a stop to ticket prices," Bonham said.
The NHL average ticket price last season was $43.60, and while the league drums
for lower salaries, so do fans for lower fares.
It's the promise of a new financial landscape that has many industry experts
pegging the NHL as a good investment. Stan Kasten, who was just recently
president of Atlanta's baseball, hockey and basketball teams, says he's
"bullish on the NHL." Clearly the value of franchises is on owners' minds when
they negotiate, but the currency of fan interest is just as important.
Enter NBC.
The league's new broadcast partner - which agreed to share revenues with the
league instead of paying a guaranteed fee - will be essential in the
"re-launch." Bettman and many others have said HDTV will make hockey a TV
sport. No glowing puck necessary. It may finally give fans what they've
previously only gotten in video games - "the best seat in the house," as Dave
Littman of EA Sports said. That's because the dimension of Hi-Def technology -
movie-like in scope - shows a sharper image of the rink.
"Let me start by saying I don't think any sport televises better in HD than
hockey," said NBC sports president Ken Schanzer. "We've got to find a way to
find it in more places. The access to HD needs to expand first. . . . But it's
the spectacle of the game that just shows better. Whether it's the ice or
details of the action. It's not just about (seeing) the puck. It's the
vividness of the whole sport. It flat shows better. . . .
"We want to capture that experience."
Nabbing a fertile TV contract is a goal for the league, but sports marketing
professor Paul Swangard, director of the Warsaw Sports Marketing Center at the
University of Oregon, said "it will have to earn the TV contract it doesn't
deserve." Producing a more exciting game via new rules could cultivate TV
ratings, and that in turn could crank the promotion of the league.
Marketing
A key element of the "re-launch" will involve marketing the players.
"Let's face it, hockey does not have a high profile right now," Kasten said.
"The top cadre of players aren't well known enough. What can we do for a TV
contract? Increase our appeal. The league won't like me saying this, but Jarome
Iginla, Martin St. Louis, Rick Nash - these players have to be in (bigger
markets). Your best and brightest young players have to be in your biggest
media markets to give us a fighting chance."
And then there are tickets.
Baseball saw a 20 percent decline in attendance the year after the World
Series-canceling strike. Basketball, when it came out of the lockout for a
shortened 1999 season, saw an immediate spike in attendance and TV ratings.
Both dropped noticeably in the subsequent season. Key elements of the NBA's
recovery plan involved courting its fans and addressing issues like ticket
prices.
When basketball resumed, teams were given three mandates:
Hold a free practice for the public.
Play a preseason game that's free, at least for season-ticket
holders.
Provide at least 500 tickets for each game at $10 or less.
The last rule remains in place.
"We knew that it would be important to acknowledge that we and the players -
what we had put the fan through," said Rick Welts, the chief marketing officer
for the NBA who shepherded the league out of the lockout and is now the Phoenix
Suns president. "We knew that what we had just inflicted on the fans was not a
good thing and we did whatever we had to express that."
Members of the Portland Trail Blazers office staff called season ticket holders
during the lockout. And more 300,000 Valentine's Day Cards were signed by
players and sent out to fans.
Whom did Welts get some of the ideas from?
"Ironically," he said, "we leaned on the NHL for ideas."
The calling card
Now it's the NHL's turn to look at the NBA and elsewhere when brainstorming
elements of its "re-launch."
New York Islanders general manager Mike Milbury has been calling season-ticket
holders during the lockout. Bettman has held some town meetings in NHL cities
but does not have a St. Louis visit scheduled. Nashville coach Barry Trotz -
who said his team is often pegged as a "contraction franchise" - has held
coaching clinics for fans. Trotz said it's all part of an effort to retain the
core fans while realizing "with the casual fan in the non-traditional markets
you may have to start all over again."
Horne declined to go into details of the "re-launch," saying many of the
specifics are in the early stages of brainstorming and planning. Also, he wants
to retain an element of surprise when the new NHL brand is launched. The NHL
planned a "re-launch" with or without a work stoppage. The lockout has simply
added gravity.
Generally, Horne said, it will involve suggested events for teams and tie-in
promotions. It will involve "a contemporary, vibrant" new look and recurring
"re-launch" theme. He said he wants to put fans more in touch with the game,
more involved with the game. The league's history and claim to fame - the
Stanley Cup - will be part of it. Players will be essential to helping the
league recover from the stoppage.
But few of the "re-launch" details are finalized.
Because any "re-launch" is delayed.
"The key to any revival is, first and foremost, to not only reintroduce our
sport to the fans but to reintroduce our players to them," said Blues executive
Jim Woodcock, who sits on the league's marketing committee helping the
"re-launch" project. "This will be a time for forgiveness, for healing. For the
organization and for the players to take responsibility for what has happened.
"That has to be the calling card of what we do."
Статейка сама по себе немного старая,но все хочется услышать мнения юзеров этого форума.Особенно меня интересует часть которую я обвел крупным шрифтом.Суть которой сводится к тому:"если НХЛ хочет быть конкурентноспособной на ТВ,нужно чтобы звезды а-ля Нэш или Игинла играли в командах которые находятся в больших финансовых городах а-ля Торонто,Нью Йoрк". Хм в целом идея Бетмана хорошая,НХЛ нужен новый старт,а если еще локаут затянется то без этого старта НХЛ просто не обойдется.Но дело не в этом,если Бетман добивается потолка зарплат и если он его добьется то как такие клубы смогут себе позволить себе Игинлу или Нэша,если по сути у Коламбуса и Калгари будут очень неплохие шансы удержать их у себя.И вообще,из того что я читал команды с больших хоккейных городов такие как Нью Йoрк, Торонто,Филадельфия и без Нешов с игинлами могут приносить прибыль,а вот для таких команд как Коламбус и Калгари эти игроки очень важны в маркетинговом аспекте.Или я не прав!?
Вообщем статья и сама идея мне понравилась до момента со звездными игроками.Мне кажется для поднятия интереса на ТВ это большой роли не играет.Также не уверен что эти супер новые технолиге помогут заманить новых зрителей.Нужны в первую очередь изминения в правилах,причем не одно,а несколько....
ничего так, обсуждать есть что 