Okay, this isn't a top ten list like a certain beloved, recently retired, late night talk show host. This is serious business here. As in how to succeed in business as an MASL franchise in Cedar Rapids. Some of these are a bit obvious or Sports Franchise 101 but it's important to get these right. Here they are ranked in order of importance...
10) Sign a local player - Part of what has brought fans to Titans games is seeing Iowa players continue their careers at home. Now, this can't quite be replicated in soccer, but it wouldn't hurt to give Lance Rozeboom or Ian Christianson a call (though being on the Vancouver Whitecaps of MLS' reserve squad might hinder that) and make them the face of your franchise. Or you could see who the next Iowa football Tavian Banks that was a solid soccer player and give them a ring. It wouldn't hurt to put butts in the seats.
9) Camps - Now this seems like a no-brainer, but you've got to get as many of those corridor youth and soccer moms and dads that were mentioned at the franchise announcement to go to smartly priced camps and clinics. I say smartly priced because this is as much advertising your brand as it is another source of revenue. Pricing should make it profitable, but also send the message that this is the people's team.
8) Stylish Merchandise - This may seem like a trivial thing, but the little things can have a huge impact. All sports are tribal, but especially soccer. Tribes want to wear their symbols and colors and want to do it in a way that espouses their identities. Use the city iconography of Cedar Rapids. Make shirts, hats and jerseys stylish and appealing. The jersey is more important to get right than in any other sport because a higher percentage of fans buy the jersey in soccer than in other sports. Hockey may be a close second, but you can't wear a hockey jersey in as many places and they are quite expensive. The jersey can act not just as another revenue stream, but as a great advertisement for your sponsor and your team. Get this right: Simple, classic, but not completely boring.
7) Engage the Hispanic community - I can't emphasize this point enough. This is a whole segment of the population that really doesn't show in force at other events as they are not catered to. The key here is that soccer is THEIR sport, it is #1. This is like arena football moving in for your Anglo-Saxon, fourth generation Iowan. Market to them via outlets they frequent/listen to/watch and do it in Spanish as well. Sign at least one very good Hispanic player. Show up at their events. Have a Latin Heritage night. This is one area soccer demographics differ from other sports, so make it work in your favor. They would also appreciate...
6) Create indoor leagues - Get BOTH kids and adults playing. There is a serious lack of indoor soccer opportunities in Cedar Rapids, especially for adults. Leagues for all ages gets people more engaged and introduces another revenue opportunity. Make different t-shirts with the Rampage logo and a number for the teams (gets that logo out in public), heck even call it the "Rampage Reserves League" and mine talent from it eventually. Make players feel a connection to the club.
5) Don't forget the grown-ups - A huge portion of soccer fans are young when compared to the other sports, and in that lovely marketing sweet-spot of being in their twenties and thirties. Make the Rampage THE place to be for these people on cold winter nights. Be innovative and active on social media. Do fun giveaways. Drink specials, ladies nights (don't underestimate the power of your female fans. They will drive your male fans on the fence), live music, etc. But like anything, this has to be balanced. Which leads to...
4) Be visible in the community - One thing the Titans do well is get out into the community. Get the Rampage players going to schools, parades, festivals, after-school programs, non-soccer camps, Newbo market on weekends, basically try not to let a public event or institution go by untouched. It is great free advertising and makes sure they don't forget you are there.
3) Be visible on TV/Radio/Media - Mediacom is already listed as a sponsor and this is fantastic. Hopefully Mediacom Connections 22 signs on to broadcast games on tape delay and (much like the Titans already do) and MAYBE even an away match in St. Louis or Milwaukee. There is just simply no way in creating repeat customers unless they see the product. Give a couple tickets away via a different outlet each week, so as to catch as wide a variety of people to just a taste of your product. But too many giveaways cheapens the product and makes customers lazy about spending. A little goes a long way. TV broadcasts advertise to them at home and gets them wanting to spend to see the product live.
2) Game presentation - If they do want to see the product live, don't drive them off. One of the major complaints of fans about the RoughRiders is the constant inundation of noise. Do NOT, for example, just have loud music running constantly over the PA. Now I'm not saying to never run music or sound effects over the PA, I'm just saying a little goes a long way. I am a hockey fan much more than a baseball fan, and yet one of the great things about a Kernels game is that one can actually carry on a conversation during the game. Something very difficult at RoughRiders games. Drums, horns, etc. during game play is great. Heck, the marketing wizards of the MLS attendance-shattering, Qwest Field-filling Seattle Sounders even have a marching band, the Sound Wave. Horns, drums, band music just creates an atmosphere that can't be duplicated. Just ask any college basketball or football fan. The Titans have done well with this.
1) Win - None of the above will be as successful without it. In fact, it is crucial for much of the above, and much of the little things above are crucial to it. People want to connect with that which gives them pride. They want to walk away entertained and satisfied. Winning goes a long way to doing that. The team on the field HAS to take precedent to achieve any long term success.
Monday, July 20, 2015
Saturday, July 18, 2015
The Name and Logo revealed...
The new MASL team in Cedar Rapids is (drum roll, please)...
Cedar Rapids Rampage SC. Okay, myself and the two other founding amigos huddled together post-announcement, and here is what we determined was the best and worst of the new name and logo.
Name:
Pros - Related to Cedar Rapids (quite literally the rapids), alliterative, NOT euro-wannabe
Cons - Lacking originality (been done before), not a unique enough feature of the town.
Grade - We like the reference to the rampaging rapids that often are seen in a swelling Cedar River. Interestingly, it verges on the common theme in American soccer naming one's club after the natural disaster that devastated the home city (Chicago Fire based on the 1871 fire, San Jose Earthquakes on the quake of 1912, and now this which makes one think of the rampaging waters of the Flood of '08). For me, it also rings eerily similar to the Grand Rapids Rampage, a former Arena Football League team just down the road from where I lived as a teen (they used a rampaging Rhino in their crest). B-
Logo:
Pros - Classic soccer crest, the rampaging rapids over the letter "R", and is it just me, or do those rapids look an awful lot like a backwards "C"? As in "CR"?, the color scheme, the word mark.
Cons - A clear "CR" would be nice, no clear mascot, lacking unique city iconography, a little too like a cop badge.
Grade - Cons might be a little nit-picky (we had to list some) but they mean we can't give an "A". Reaction from us and others (judging by Facebook comments) was very good. Instantly one of the best logos in the MASL (we split on Dallas Sidekicks, Missouri Comets, and Milwaukee Wave logos as our favorites.) A-.
Overall Grade: B+. But names and logos have a way of growing on you. Certainly it could have been worse, we could have been United FC, Sporting, or (shudder) Real. We avoided those...phew!
Name:
Pros - Related to Cedar Rapids (quite literally the rapids), alliterative, NOT euro-wannabe
Cons - Lacking originality (been done before), not a unique enough feature of the town.
Grade - We like the reference to the rampaging rapids that often are seen in a swelling Cedar River. Interestingly, it verges on the common theme in American soccer naming one's club after the natural disaster that devastated the home city (Chicago Fire based on the 1871 fire, San Jose Earthquakes on the quake of 1912, and now this which makes one think of the rampaging waters of the Flood of '08). For me, it also rings eerily similar to the Grand Rapids Rampage, a former Arena Football League team just down the road from where I lived as a teen (they used a rampaging Rhino in their crest). B-
Logo:
Pros - Classic soccer crest, the rampaging rapids over the letter "R", and is it just me, or do those rapids look an awful lot like a backwards "C"? As in "CR"?, the color scheme, the word mark.
Cons - A clear "CR" would be nice, no clear mascot, lacking unique city iconography, a little too like a cop badge.
Grade - Cons might be a little nit-picky (we had to list some) but they mean we can't give an "A". Reaction from us and others (judging by Facebook comments) was very good. Instantly one of the best logos in the MASL (we split on Dallas Sidekicks, Missouri Comets, and Milwaukee Wave logos as our favorites.) A-.
Overall Grade: B+. But names and logos have a way of growing on you. Certainly it could have been worse, we could have been United FC, Sporting, or (shudder) Real. We avoided those...phew!
Wednesday, July 1, 2015
MASL - A Past, Present, and Future History for Dummies...from this dummy.
As was mentioned in an earlier dispatch, many MASL clubs have surprisingly long and storied histories. Today we look at the history of indoor soccer as it pertains to where it started, where it has been to this point, and where it seems headed in 2015 and beyond. With nearly 35 years of professional indoor soccer in this country, there is so much more to be said than this brief summary. Simply Google the history of indoor soccer and you'll get some excellent exhaustive histories. However, this history will be perspective as it relates specifically to the current MASL with an eye towards the future of the league.
ABOVE: Comets vs. Blast in the MISL circa 1982.
Past
Prior to the late 1970s indoor soccer was a mere exhibition phenomenon. For example, Madison Square Garden hosted large crowds for ASL teams in the 1930s, when immigrants fueled large crowds and demand for that league's product. But the real genesis of the modern indoor game comes from the NASL, that 1970s outdoor league of superstars that grew too big, too soon for its own good. It's existence came to be from NASL owners looking to attract new fans to the game with a fast paced, high scoring form of the game, that could fill arenas in winter months. The success of the first two NASL indoor "tournaments" (similar to the indoor tournaments the German Bundesliga sponsors) prompted the startup of a full indoor league, the Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL), in 1978. The Kansas City Comets and Baltimore Blast were teams of that original MISL who were later resurrected and are part of today's MASL. The new indoor league came at the right time, as the NASL and the soccer "fad" of the late 70s was reaching its zenith. Crowds packed arenas to watch this ultra-faced hybrid of the game as attendance doubled over the course of the first 4 seasons to over 8,000 a match by the 1981-82 season (an average it would maintain to nearly the end of the decade). In fact, it was at an MISL all-star game that the future Arena Football League was conceived.
The NASL, not wanting to miss out on the action, had their own teams play full seasons indoors starting in 1979. One team to take a liking to indoor soccer was the Rochester Lancers, who had been NASL Champions of 1970 in the outdoor game. In the leagues second indoor tournament in 1976, they made the championship final. They went on to lose the Tampa Bay Rowdies, but Rochester went back to the indoor game years later and are in the MASL today. But one team from the original NASL had even greater success moving to the indoor game. The San Diego Sockers continually fell just short of the finals in the outdoor game, but in the indoor game they became a dynasty. Beginning in the 1981-82 season, they would win 10 championships under head coach Ron Newman, becoming the unquestionable dynasty of indoor soccer in the 1980s. The MASL championship trophy bears Newman's name today, and the Sockers continue to compete in the current league, having gone through three different incarnations.
When the NASL collapsed as an outdoor league by 1985, many of the teams (such as the Comets and Blast) continued on by becoming a part of the MISL. By the early 1990's, as attendance dipped slightly, it was clear the league had become the haves and have-nots. After 1992, the league folded. Four of the seven teams carried on in two new rival leagues: the CISL and the NPSL. The National Professional Soccer League was a rival league in the mid-80s (known as the American Indoor Soccer Association until 1990) that introduced the concept of multi-point scoring, where there were one , two, or three point goals based on lines of distance from goal. It gained national exposure by becoming a regular league on the new espn2 network. This league produced a number of well-run franchises. The Milwaukee Wave started as a founding member in 1984 whose stability didn't bear championship fruit until the 1990s. It plays in the MASL as the longest continuously operated soccer club in the United States. The St. Louis Ambush and Harrisburg Heat were also solid franchises from that league that have been resurrected and now play in the MASL.
The Continental Indoor Soccer League was the brainchild of NBA and NHL owners looking to capitalize on the fact that soccer had hit a burst of popularity with the US outdoor national team having qualified for World Cup 1990 and hosting the same event in 1994. The indoor national team made the World Cup of Futsal Final in 1991 with many indoor stars as well. These owners saw soccer as a way to fill arenas in the summer months. Hence the CISL was the first indoor soccer league to be played in summer. Besides the season played in, the CISL also differed from the NPSL as it maintained the traditional 1 point per goal. It too flexed its muscle in landing a national TV deal with Fox Sports Networks. The Dallas Sidekicks were an MISL team that thrived in this new league. They won their second championship in the league's debut season of 1993, over fellow indoor heavyweights, the San Diego Sockers. The CISL, with the backing of powerful sports owners, saw a rise in attendance to nearly 7,000 average fans by 1996. However, serious differences of where the league should go forward doomed it to shut down after 1997, with many of its best players having gone on to be founding members of the newly created outdoor league (Major League Soccer or "MLS").
The rise of the new outdoor league and it's lower divisions began to overshadow the indoor game. The two competing leagues eventually collapsed into a new MISL (which ran on Fox Soccer Channel). They then saw another rift as teams departed for the decidedly cost conscious and smaller-venued PASL. Eventually, these teams as well as new organizations came back into the fold when they merged with a few remaining MISL teams into the current MASL.
ABOVE: Milwaukee Wave made (ahem) waves by introducing black turf to UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena. The Wave are the oldest continuous soccer club in the United States.
Present
Currently, the MASL's challenge is how to run a national league that both makes a profit, and carves a new niche in the ever expanding world of outdoor soccer. The large market teams of the Milwaukee Wave, Dallas Sidekicks, St. Louis Ambush, and Missouri Comets have done well by downsizing out of their market's largest arenas and going into more intimate second-tier venues. For example, the Missouri Comets moved from Kansas City to Independence Events Center, with great success. St. Louis Ambush are thriving in the St. Charles' Family Arena (most famous as being the home of the MVC Women's College Basketball Tournament), where it is one of the league leaders in attendance. In fact, the only one of the mentioned clubs from a downtown location is the Wave, who moved across the street from the Bradley Center to the smaller UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena. Non-traditional "major" markets like Harrisburg, Rochester, Syracuse, and Tacoma are bedrock teams in the league, playing in the biggest arenas in town and with deep roots in their communities.
ABOVE: The Missouri Comets draw well at the Independence Events Center in Independence, MO.
Future
The third and final frontier for league expansion seems to be this: go where the market's soccer dollars are not going to outdoor clubs. Hartford, Youngstown, Tulsa, Turlock-Modesto, Brownsville, Ontario and Cedar Rapids seem to be in this category. This strategy is risky in that these are not large markets in core city population, but it may be wise in that the indoor game can establish itself in decent sized, soccer-starved markets. Places where the ever growing outdoor game hasn't gotten its hands (or better yet feet) into. Early results seem mixed. Tulsa, Brownsville, and Turlock barely push a 1,000 spectators through the doors, while Wichita and especially Ontario are doing better. With many outdoor players now using indoor soccer as a way to make a living while in the lower divisions, the salary demands are not as great as they once were (a recent piece by the New York Times on the Cleveland Crunch of the early-90s noted that player salaries in the late 80s and early 90s would often be six figures for the bigger stars). However, with ESPN3 now on as a broadcast partner, filling arenas will be important to getting on television.
Cedar Rapids and the Technology Corridor of Iowa certainly fit the bill of a starving market. While the Des Moines Menace have consistently been at or near the top of the 4th division PDL's attendance figures, the closest foray outdoor soccer has made into Iowa's second largest market was the semi-pro Comets of the mid-1980s. The MASL is banking on the fact that the Titans can use their expertise at tapping into youth camps, sponsorship dollars, and attendance, to make the MASL a success in what is essentially the City of Five Seasons first foray into the soccer world. And you can't get a second chance at a first impression, so doing it right will affect the way residents view soccer in this area for years to come. In a coming installment, we will look at how they can make that first impression a positive one.
NOTE: Thanks to Kenn Tomasch and kenn.com/the_blog/ for some helpful corrections.
Past
Prior to the late 1970s indoor soccer was a mere exhibition phenomenon. For example, Madison Square Garden hosted large crowds for ASL teams in the 1930s, when immigrants fueled large crowds and demand for that league's product. But the real genesis of the modern indoor game comes from the NASL, that 1970s outdoor league of superstars that grew too big, too soon for its own good. It's existence came to be from NASL owners looking to attract new fans to the game with a fast paced, high scoring form of the game, that could fill arenas in winter months. The success of the first two NASL indoor "tournaments" (similar to the indoor tournaments the German Bundesliga sponsors) prompted the startup of a full indoor league, the Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL), in 1978. The Kansas City Comets and Baltimore Blast were teams of that original MISL who were later resurrected and are part of today's MASL. The new indoor league came at the right time, as the NASL and the soccer "fad" of the late 70s was reaching its zenith. Crowds packed arenas to watch this ultra-faced hybrid of the game as attendance doubled over the course of the first 4 seasons to over 8,000 a match by the 1981-82 season (an average it would maintain to nearly the end of the decade). In fact, it was at an MISL all-star game that the future Arena Football League was conceived.
The NASL, not wanting to miss out on the action, had their own teams play full seasons indoors starting in 1979. One team to take a liking to indoor soccer was the Rochester Lancers, who had been NASL Champions of 1970 in the outdoor game. In the leagues second indoor tournament in 1976, they made the championship final. They went on to lose the Tampa Bay Rowdies, but Rochester went back to the indoor game years later and are in the MASL today. But one team from the original NASL had even greater success moving to the indoor game. The San Diego Sockers continually fell just short of the finals in the outdoor game, but in the indoor game they became a dynasty. Beginning in the 1981-82 season, they would win 10 championships under head coach Ron Newman, becoming the unquestionable dynasty of indoor soccer in the 1980s. The MASL championship trophy bears Newman's name today, and the Sockers continue to compete in the current league, having gone through three different incarnations.
When the NASL collapsed as an outdoor league by 1985, many of the teams (such as the Comets and Blast) continued on by becoming a part of the MISL. By the early 1990's, as attendance dipped slightly, it was clear the league had become the haves and have-nots. After 1992, the league folded. Four of the seven teams carried on in two new rival leagues: the CISL and the NPSL. The National Professional Soccer League was a rival league in the mid-80s (known as the American Indoor Soccer Association until 1990) that introduced the concept of multi-point scoring, where there were one , two, or three point goals based on lines of distance from goal. It gained national exposure by becoming a regular league on the new espn2 network. This league produced a number of well-run franchises. The Milwaukee Wave started as a founding member in 1984 whose stability didn't bear championship fruit until the 1990s. It plays in the MASL as the longest continuously operated soccer club in the United States. The St. Louis Ambush and Harrisburg Heat were also solid franchises from that league that have been resurrected and now play in the MASL.
The Continental Indoor Soccer League was the brainchild of NBA and NHL owners looking to capitalize on the fact that soccer had hit a burst of popularity with the US outdoor national team having qualified for World Cup 1990 and hosting the same event in 1994. The indoor national team made the World Cup of Futsal Final in 1991 with many indoor stars as well. These owners saw soccer as a way to fill arenas in the summer months. Hence the CISL was the first indoor soccer league to be played in summer. Besides the season played in, the CISL also differed from the NPSL as it maintained the traditional 1 point per goal. It too flexed its muscle in landing a national TV deal with Fox Sports Networks. The Dallas Sidekicks were an MISL team that thrived in this new league. They won their second championship in the league's debut season of 1993, over fellow indoor heavyweights, the San Diego Sockers. The CISL, with the backing of powerful sports owners, saw a rise in attendance to nearly 7,000 average fans by 1996. However, serious differences of where the league should go forward doomed it to shut down after 1997, with many of its best players having gone on to be founding members of the newly created outdoor league (Major League Soccer or "MLS").
The rise of the new outdoor league and it's lower divisions began to overshadow the indoor game. The two competing leagues eventually collapsed into a new MISL (which ran on Fox Soccer Channel). They then saw another rift as teams departed for the decidedly cost conscious and smaller-venued PASL. Eventually, these teams as well as new organizations came back into the fold when they merged with a few remaining MISL teams into the current MASL.
ABOVE: Milwaukee Wave made (ahem) waves by introducing black turf to UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena. The Wave are the oldest continuous soccer club in the United States.
Present
Currently, the MASL's challenge is how to run a national league that both makes a profit, and carves a new niche in the ever expanding world of outdoor soccer. The large market teams of the Milwaukee Wave, Dallas Sidekicks, St. Louis Ambush, and Missouri Comets have done well by downsizing out of their market's largest arenas and going into more intimate second-tier venues. For example, the Missouri Comets moved from Kansas City to Independence Events Center, with great success. St. Louis Ambush are thriving in the St. Charles' Family Arena (most famous as being the home of the MVC Women's College Basketball Tournament), where it is one of the league leaders in attendance. In fact, the only one of the mentioned clubs from a downtown location is the Wave, who moved across the street from the Bradley Center to the smaller UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena. Non-traditional "major" markets like Harrisburg, Rochester, Syracuse, and Tacoma are bedrock teams in the league, playing in the biggest arenas in town and with deep roots in their communities.
Future
The third and final frontier for league expansion seems to be this: go where the market's soccer dollars are not going to outdoor clubs. Hartford, Youngstown, Tulsa, Turlock-Modesto, Brownsville, Ontario and Cedar Rapids seem to be in this category. This strategy is risky in that these are not large markets in core city population, but it may be wise in that the indoor game can establish itself in decent sized, soccer-starved markets. Places where the ever growing outdoor game hasn't gotten its hands (or better yet feet) into. Early results seem mixed. Tulsa, Brownsville, and Turlock barely push a 1,000 spectators through the doors, while Wichita and especially Ontario are doing better. With many outdoor players now using indoor soccer as a way to make a living while in the lower divisions, the salary demands are not as great as they once were (a recent piece by the New York Times on the Cleveland Crunch of the early-90s noted that player salaries in the late 80s and early 90s would often be six figures for the bigger stars). However, with ESPN3 now on as a broadcast partner, filling arenas will be important to getting on television.
Cedar Rapids and the Technology Corridor of Iowa certainly fit the bill of a starving market. While the Des Moines Menace have consistently been at or near the top of the 4th division PDL's attendance figures, the closest foray outdoor soccer has made into Iowa's second largest market was the semi-pro Comets of the mid-1980s. The MASL is banking on the fact that the Titans can use their expertise at tapping into youth camps, sponsorship dollars, and attendance, to make the MASL a success in what is essentially the City of Five Seasons first foray into the soccer world. And you can't get a second chance at a first impression, so doing it right will affect the way residents view soccer in this area for years to come. In a coming installment, we will look at how they can make that first impression a positive one.
NOTE: Thanks to Kenn Tomasch and kenn.com/the_blog/ for some helpful corrections.
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