Bowling For Dollars: Every Game Has Sponsor

NEW YORK - Corporate America has gone bowling for dollars.

U.S. Fidelity & Guaranty started it. Sunkist, Mobil, John Hancock and Federal Express joined in.

On Dec. 15, another corporation joins the group of companies sponsoring college football bowl games. Two universities will take the field at Shreveport, La., in the Poulan-Weed Eater Independence Bowl.

What's a Poulan-Weed Eater?

And why would anyone running a football game want that name?

``It is a long title, but we love it,'' Pat Tiller, the bowl's director of marketing, said. ``It's now becoming almost a credibility thing in dealing with the TV networks and the TV contracts. That's the game you got to play now.''

Twelve bowls have title sponsors and seven do not. Of the do-nots, only the Rose Bowl has said that it's absolutely not interested.

``I guess we like it the way it is,'' William Flinn, the Rose's assistant executive director, said. ``Why go to corporate sponsorship? I guess that it's more money. But if you don't need to do that, why? We didn't start the Rose Bowl game for money.''

Then again, no other bowl has the $100 million, nine-year contract that the Rose signed with ABC.

The Rose gave Michigan and Southern California $5.5 million each last season, the largest bowl payout. The Orange was next, giving Colorado and Notre Dame $4.1 million each. A four-year agreement with Federal Express worth about $2.2 million last season made the high Orange payout possible.

``It was very hard for our people to say that they wanted a title sponsor,'' Orange Bowl executive director Steve Hatchell said. ``We felt that among the traditional January 1 games there is a competitive unwritten race for better payouts. We felt the title sponsor dollars put us in a position to put together the best matchups in any given year.''

USF&G became the first title sponsor of a bowl when it signed with the Sugar for the 1987 game. It has agreed to a five-year extension that runs through 1996.

``Prior to 1981, USF&G did virtually no advertising,'' Kenneth Hatter, the company's advertising director, said. ``In the years since 1981, we've been tracking awareness of the USF&G name and it has been moving up considerably.''

According to company statistics, the company had 49 percent awareness in 1981 among people who buy property and casualty insurance. The figure increased to 75 percent by 1989.

``It's clear we're deriving a benefit from the Sugar Bowl,'' Hatter said.

Joyce Julius and Associates, an Ann Arbor, Mich., sports marketing firm, has attempted to determine how much exposure corporations gain from their associations with sporting events.

USF&G's logo was seen for 15 minutes, 8 seconds, during last season's Sugar Bowl, according to a Joyce Julius study. Federal Express was on for only 3:56 during the Orange Bowl. In addition, USF&G was mentioned 14 times on ABC's telecast and Federal Express was mentioned 11 times on NBC's broadcast of the Orange Bowl.

``USF&G has been at it a little longer,'' Nancy Altenburg, the Federal Express manager of advertising and sports marketing, said. ``As we go, we are fine tuning.''

At the Sugar Bowl, USF&G had a logo at the 50-yard line, two 27-foot banners on an upper deck and about 20 small paper posters along the wall that circles the field, according to Troy Mathieu, the bowl's assistant to the executive director.

``It's noticeable but it's not a dominating presence compared to some of the permanent signage that hangs in the Superdome,'' Mathieu said.

In addition, the bowls now ask - but do not require - teams to wear bowl logo patches on their uniforms. The patches contain the corporate logos, too, and a USF&G logo on the shoulder of Miami quarterback Craig Erickson appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

``The Sugar Bowl committee has gone to great lengths to make sure everyone at the game knows it's the USF&G Sugar Bowl,'' Hatter said.

John Hancock took the title sponsor idea a step further. It began backing the Sun Bowl in 1986, changing the bowl's name to the John Hancock Sun Bowl. When it renewed for a $9 million, five-year deal that began last season, it had the game's name changed to the John Hancock Bowl.

``In a lot of press reports, the first reference wasn't correct and we were getting dropped out, which wasn't fair,'' Jack Mahoney, a sports marketing consultant for John Hancock, said. ``A lot of papers felt they should do this, since it was free advertising. Our feeling with Hancock was that for the money we were paying, we ought to get our name mentioned once.''

With the word ``Sun'' dropped, John Hancock was mentioned in almost every story. Mahoney said the company invested about $1.6 million ($1 million to the game, $500,000 in advertising and $100,000 in scholarship money) and received the equivalent of $4.8 million in print advertising in return.

Corporations are not the only organizations increasing the stakes. NCAA rules call for bowls to give each team at least $600,000 this season, a $100,000 increase from last year. The minimum goes to $650,000 next season, $700,000 in 1992 and $750,000 in 1993.

``We've been pretty much against a corporate sponsorship, but in order to keep up with the others, it's imperative we have to look in that direction,'' Liberty Bowl executive director A.F. ``Bud'' Dudley said. ``It didn't seem to tie in too well with our theme - liberty, the patriot theme. But things have a way of changing in life.''

The Liberty Bowl recently hired Del Wilber and Associates, a sports marketing company, to try to find a sponsor. Last month the Independence Bowl signed with Poulan Weed-Eater, located in its home city of Shreveport.

``We stumbled upon Poulan by calling on local businesses for local sponsorship. They expressed interest in a larger investment,'' said Tiller of the Independence Bowl, which began in the bicentennial year of 1976.

Poulan Weed-Eater said it didn't get into the bowl business to increase its name recognition. It signed for $250,000 to keep the Independence Bowl in business.

``I haven't even attempted to make a measurement of what it might mean to us,'' Carl Mikovich, the company's president, said. ``But as soon as the release went out, we've heard from people all across the country. I'm talking about our principal customers.''

Altenburg said most companies have four reasons for getting into the bowl business.

``Number one is increased exposure,'' she said. ``Second is the opportunity for an intimate selling forum for key customers and clients. Thirdly, you generate goodwill in the community and nationally. And fourth is to boost employee morale and pride.''