Marketing professional golf
I came across a timely piece in an email newsletter I receive about how easy the LPGA Tour is to work with for sponsors. (Click on the title of this post for the actual article.)
"Timely" because Neil MacKenzie and I have been talking lately about the PGA Tour and Greensboro's own Chrysler Classic. Many of you may know that the Tour is making a lot of noise lately about cutting back the number of events per year in the future. Some of the players feel the season is too long, and some of the sponsors, writers and others complain that a second or third tier field is too often the case at tournaments that aren't one of the four majors or A-listers like Bay Hill or the Memorial.
Greensboro's Tour event would be a possible candidate for being dropped or for reassignment; few would argue that. Despite its 68-year history, the fall dates, the end of season feeling - these are the things that could likely spell doom for the tournament. So what should Greensboro's movers and shakers be doing?
One idea Neil and I discussed: Court the LPGA Tour...now, before possibly being spurned by the PGA Tour. Jockey to be a top 10 event on the LPGA schedule by (a) getting a large, local sponsor involved (VF, Furnitureland South, Jefferson Pilot, et al.), and (b) aggressively promoting the "new" professional golf event as a way of revitalizing the community overall.
I think the LPGA Tour is on the verge of being a very hot property. If we're going to do it, now is the time.
"Timely" because Neil MacKenzie and I have been talking lately about the PGA Tour and Greensboro's own Chrysler Classic. Many of you may know that the Tour is making a lot of noise lately about cutting back the number of events per year in the future. Some of the players feel the season is too long, and some of the sponsors, writers and others complain that a second or third tier field is too often the case at tournaments that aren't one of the four majors or A-listers like Bay Hill or the Memorial.
Greensboro's Tour event would be a possible candidate for being dropped or for reassignment; few would argue that. Despite its 68-year history, the fall dates, the end of season feeling - these are the things that could likely spell doom for the tournament. So what should Greensboro's movers and shakers be doing?
One idea Neil and I discussed: Court the LPGA Tour...now, before possibly being spurned by the PGA Tour. Jockey to be a top 10 event on the LPGA schedule by (a) getting a large, local sponsor involved (VF, Furnitureland South, Jefferson Pilot, et al.), and (b) aggressively promoting the "new" professional golf event as a way of revitalizing the community overall.
I think the LPGA Tour is on the verge of being a very hot property. If we're going to do it, now is the time.
posted by Mark Burris - BURRIS at 7/12/2005 04:35:00 PM
1 Comments:
A few days after making this post, I came across this, by John Hawkins, in the July 15, 2005, issue of Golf World: "What sounds more interesting: the Chrysler Classic of Greensboro or a match-play field of 32 [TOUR and LPGA players] with a random draw? Adam Scott versus Paula Creamer or David Toms versus Natalie Gulbis, I'm guessing, might produce a higher rating than, say, Scott McCarron versus Kevin Sutherland."
(The article, "The best 15-year-old in golf," is ostensibly about Michelle Wie. It'll be posted on Golf World's anemic web site eventually, but it's not there yet.")
Hawkins believes Wie could bring about better, more valuable cooperation between the men's and women's tours, and in the process deliver some compelling entertainment to golf fans and viewers.
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