Wrestling With Success
An odd thing happened one night in late October. At the same time the league that slams basketballs was nervously canceling upcoming games because of labor strife, two leagues that slam bodies were enjoying another evening of delirious prosperity. While nearly six million Americans were watching the World Championship Wrestling’s Monday Nitro and the World Wrestling Federation’s Raw Is War top-rated cablecasts, the National Basketball Association’s owners and players were doing some outrageous wrestling of their own. But unlike the WCW and WWF’s, the NBA’s wrangling was no act. The way things looked, hoops rivals turned “rasslers” Dennis Rodman and Karl Malone might have to team up with ring combatants Stone Cold Steve Austin and Goldberg for real.
Professional wrestling, languishing only a few years ago after a great run in the ’80s, is enjoying a giddy resurgence these days, inside and outside the ring. Finally dropping ludicrous past claims of being legitimate athletic competition, the WCW and WWF are now selling themselves as “sports entertainment” – and a demographically broadened fan base is gladly buying the concept. Between their respective cable, syndicated, and pay-per-view telecasts, sold-out live events, and far-reaching licensing and merchandising deals, the competing wrestling entities are giving all legit sports, not just basketball, a run for their marketing money.
Of course, where there’s marketing, there are promotions, and wrestling has come up with some as distinctive as the Undertaker’s arm lengths of tattoos. The WCW and its corporate partners tag team on programs such as a bowling league, credit cards, Nitro Party contests, and oversized video game boxes dancing in the ring. Not to be outdone, the WWF stages sweepstakes with the purchase of action figures, a sponsored on-air “Slam of the Week,” and an in-arena airship emblazoned with a candy company’s logo. And from the “they couldn’t have scripted it any better” department, just how much afterglow do you think wrestling in general registered on November 3 when former WWF superstar Jesse “The Body” Ventura pulled an UpsetMania and was elected governor of Minnesota?
“We have gone to the flagship companies, such as M&M Mars, Sony, Coke, MCI, and movie studios, and said, What is your message? We have a conduit to consumers, and through our properties we can do promotions that are unbelievable in the marketplace,” remarks Jim Rothschild, senior vice president of sales for the $500-million-a-year WWF, headquartered in Stamford, CT. “We sit down with a company and its promotion agency and say, We’re the toll booth, and you want to get across the bridge to the consumer.”
The WWF, however, ain’t your typical toll booth. Manned by Barnum-esque ceo Vince McMahon, whose current in-the-ring “feud” with Stone Cold makes Steinbrenner vs. Martin look petty, the WWF was a phenomenon in the 1980s when Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, Rowdy Roddy Piper, et al had teenagers’ testosterone raging. By the early Nineties, though, steroid and sex scandals, along with tired routines, dulled the fury. Over the past few years, thanks to a new crop of wrestlers, ever-changing, soap opera-ish storylines, ambitious marketing tactics, and the proliferation of in-your-face cable programming, the WWF is back. Its teen-oriented “attitude” is intentionally edgier than what Turner Sports (a Time Warner company) gave the WCW when it launched the relatively kinder-gentler counterpart in 1988 (Monday Nitro debuted three years ago). But considering that nearly 35 million people tune in to three nights of wrestling on TNT, TBS, and the USA Network every week – the WWF and WCW vie for first or second place in the overall basic cable ratings – marketers are delighted to have a choice when it comes to promotions.
The neverending season What’s especially attractive about wrestling, compared to sports and other events, is the one-stop shopping that both operations offer. Each provides 52 weeks of live programming from sold-out arenas nationwide, monthly pay-per-view packages, on-line and print support, retail cooperation, and talent that doesn’t have a union or agents to beat you up for more money.
Jakks Pacific Toys inherited the WWF action figure license from Hasbro more than three years ago, and the Malibu, CA, company has taken full advantage of the opportunity. To complement an ingenious merchandising program at retail accounts – Toys R Us, K-Mart, Kay-Bee Toys, Ames, and Hills among them – whereby products are redesigned quarterly around major pay-per-view events, Jakks also conducts in-store sweepstakes and contests tied into those events. For the upcoming WrestleMania on March 28 in Philadelphia, for instance, Toys R Us will offer rebates on pay-per-view costs with the purchase of store-exclusive toys and sponsor a sweepstakes featuring WWF wrestlers.
“And the contest we’re planning for SummerSlam [in August] will have a grand prize unheard of,” hints Maureen Kassel, senior vice president of marketing and sales for Jakks. She won’t give particulars, but promises that it will, “probably be more unique than anything that’s ever been done in the toy business.”
A sales call Kassel recently went on with WWF’s Rothschild to K-Mart regarding a wide-ranging sponsorship program further demonstrates wrestling’s total-package strategy. The entourage also included wrestlers Shamrock, Mark Mero, and femme fatale Sable, who bombshelled the meeting when she presented the cable ratings. Imagine David Stern getting Patrick Ewing to do an NBC “must-see-TV” routine for a sponsor.
JVC, no stranger to event marketing, turned to the WCW when it came out with its teen-targeted Kaboom Box portable stereo this year. In addition to arranging local radio promos in markets where weekly WWF bouts were held, signage at the arenas, and on-site hospitality packages for dealers and retailers, JVC sponsored the on-air Slam of the Week, a 31-second action “rewind” sandwiched between a sponsor’s message.
“We changed it to the Kaboom of the Week, and customized it to what we’re doing, in each of the shows we sponsored,” says Karl Bearnarth, General Manager of JVC’s Audio Division. “Their ability to make things work well and pull together a total marketing program was not surprising,” he says when asked to assess the WWF. “One thing that did catch us off guard, though, was the enthusiasm of the live audiences.”
Maulin’ & Maraudin’ One of the WWF’s liveliest promotional partners this year, says Rothschild, has been M&M’s, which parent M&M Mars has dubbed the candy of the new millennium (MM=2000, get it?). “We tied in our properties to M&M’s, the Millennium Moment,” explains Rothschild, “with the WrestleMania Millennium Moment, brought to you by M&M’s. We had an indoor airship with the M&M’s logo. We created a special area on our AOL site, print ads in our two magazines, and point-of-sale materials at convenience stores. We arranged personal appearances with our wrestlers at stores, and provided live-event tickets to M&M’s distributors. We also designed a cable promotion, whereby cable service providers promoted our broadcasts and gave cross-promotions to M&M’s.”
Such integrated promotional packages have been key to the WCW’s meteoric success. An intriguing one, which illustrates the WCW’s attempt to reach a more mainstream consumer, was kicked off at the New York Stock Exchange on October 1. Hollywood Hulk Hogan (the former WWF stalwart was resurrected by Ted Turner), Diamond Dallas Page, Goldberg, “Macho Man” Randy Savage, and four other marquee names descended on Wall Street to ring in the launch of a WCW MasterCard program with Capital One Bank. Indeed, following a morning press conference and autograph-signing session on the floor of the exchange, the wrestlers rang the closing bell.
In the deal, Capital One is allowing consumers a choice of 12 different WCW or NWO (New World Order, the “bad guy” element of WCW, led by the 44-year-old Hogan) MasterCards. Holders are entitled to a 10% discount on WCW catalog merchandise and a quarterly newsletter. Plus, each card applicant is automatically entered into a sweepstakes to win two trips for four to a pay-per-view event in Baltimore in June; each purchase with the card is an additional application into the drawing.
“There is a lot of passion behind wrestling, and the WCW has done a great job developing a lot of loyalty and support,” says Paul Cusenza, Capital One’s vice president of value-added alliances. “If you take that loyalty and the millions of people [who view wrestling on TV weekly], it creates an exciting opportunity. There are a lot of synergies between our two companies. Both have global reach, all over the U.S., Asia, Canada, and the UK. From our perspective, the WCW is a great organization for us to be with.”
Among the venues where those WCW MasterCards will be welcome are the thousands of bowling centers around the country that are now forming WCW leagues, a promotion jointly orchestrated by Atlanta-based Odyssey Group and Strike Ten Entertainment, the marketing arm of the Bowling Proprietors Association of America (BPAA). Bowling centers are provided with promotional kits, including banners, table tents, and ad spots to help in signing up customers to 18-to-24-week leagues, and Odyssey will arrange for WCW talent to make personal appearances. Bowlers can purchase official balls, shirts, and caps featuring WCW and NWO superstars, and can purchase travel packages to events.
“We put together an elaborate sales piece and sent it to all the BPAA bowling centers,” says John Harbuck, vice president of sales for Odyssey, which created a similar program for NASCAR in 1996. “But initially the reception was lukewarm, because we were targeting people who own the centers, who are generally in their 40s, and the WCW is not on their radar screen. But as the materials penetrated the market and consumers would see the literature, interest picked up.” This fall, nearly 1,000 bowling centers will offer WCW leagues.
“They get awareness amongst the largest participatory sport,” says Harbuck, referring to Strike Ten’s claim that 54 million Americans bowl each year, “and we feature their pay-per-view events at our point of sales. At their events, the WCW supports the promotion by giving us live announcements in the arena.”
Roping ’em in Those arenas’ roped rings are enticing confines to marketers. This fall, THQ Video entered them to promote its new “WCW/NWO Revenge” game for the Nintendo 64 platform. On the November 2 Monday Nitro, the program’s bodacious cheerleaders, the Nitro Girls, performed a dance number with oversized game b oxes on-air. Additionally, WCW announcers wore specially made “WCW/NWO Revenge” shirts, and game play footage with wrestlers at the controls was featured during the broadcast.
PepsiCo’s Mug root beer is sponsoring Nitro Parties, a promotion in which viewers make home videos of their zany selves watching the broadcast and send them in to be aired. “The WCW fits the personality of our brand,” says Mug spokesman Jon Harris. “We know that the WCW is connected with more people than ever before. Their tagline is TWhere the Big Boys Play,’ and we want to be there, where men and women are watching.”
The Turner-owned WCW is just beginning to explore tie-ins with other Time Warner properties. Looney Tunes kicked off a deal starring Taz (the Tasmanian Devil) at the Warner Brothers retail store in Manhattan. And various TNT, TBS, HBO, and other affiliated programming is humped throughout wrestling broadcasts.
It’s a long shot whether Minnesota’s governor-elect – he now calls himself Jesse “The Mind” Ventura – will ever revive his promotional deal with St. Paul-based Minnesota Brewing for Pig’s Eye beer. But if you ever need proof of the power of promotions, look back at the two years Ventura spent pitching the brew. It’s certain that Skip Humphrey and Norm Coleman, whom he defeated, will be crying in their Pig’s Eye for months to come.
