French Open even more French than usual...on the sponsorship front

As one of the world's four Grand Slam tennis championships, the French Open has always had a special feel to it. The red claycourts at Roland Garros offer a distinctive look on domestic and worldwide television. Its timing and positioning as the unofficial start to summer in France and Europe (and throughout the northern hemisphere for that matter) gives every rendition a sense of renewal and optimism. More than anything, its setting in Paris makes it the most cosmopolitan of the Grand Slams and one of the more metropolitan of sports events in the world.

Yet this year, more than ever, there is a distinctly French and European feel to the presentation of the French Open.

That's because six of the Grand Slam tournament's 10 biggest sponsors are French brands. Two more are European classics. And only two are American.

The show stealer is BNP Paribas, the Paris-based, French national bank that has become synonymous with the French Open in particular and tennis in general. In addition to Roland Garros, BNP Paribas has links to the Paris Open indoor event, the Davis Cup world team tennis championships for men and, most interestingly, is in the second year of its title sponsorship of the popular Indian Wells ATP Tour event in California (its first major foray into North America).

At Roland Garros, BNP Paribas is not only marketing itself to French businesses and consumers, it is reaching out to new markets on all five continents, especially with a new english tagline centered around its mission to be a bank that's making a difference.

The same goes for most of the other five French brands associated with the French Open, especially automaker Peugeot, iconic tennis and sportswear designer Lacoste, mineral water Perrier and eyewear retailer Afflelou. French television network OrangeSport, a specialist in soccer, tennis and cycling, is likely more intent on consolidating its position within Europe, but nonetheless, as they watch French Open telecasts this week and next, many around the world will be at least asking: what is OrangeSport? 

Powerhouse brands such as Adidas of Germany and Longines of Switzerland round out the European roster at Roland Garros, while IBM and FedEx give the French Open show courts at least some U.S. corporate content.

Make no mistake, however. French brands are calling the French Open their own in the first year of the new decade. And they're doing so with pan-European and global ambitions.

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Improbable Stanley Cup playoff run allows Montreal Canadiens' centennial to resonate

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: the most important part of the business of sport is the business of winning. It's certainly the most persuasive part.

Winning is the best marketing. It's all about substance and cliches such as walking the walk and talking the talk. If business success in sport is one part product and one part marketing, the product is by far the bigger part.

That's why those who make the Montreal Canadiens the best-marketed franchise in Canada and arguably the best in the National Hockey League can thank their player roster for validating the 100th anniversary festivities in which the oldest hockey club in the world has invested so much of their resources and our attention.

This year's unexpected playoff run -- to the fifth game of the National Hockey League's eastern conference finals -- has given substance to the centennial celebrations that have become the club's staple industry the past 18 months; if not the past five years.

No amount of clever marketing can replace the inspirational impact of winning on the ice.

In this case, the Montreal Canadiens have done everything imaginable to mark the 100-year milestone with a sense of thoughtfulness, history and class: by retiring a series of sweater numbers in the five years leading to the 2008-'09 centennial; using last year to showcase and market a cross-section of the club's retro jerseys dating back to their first game in 1909; producing a 100th anniversary DVD; and culminating everything with the actual anniversary game in November of 2009, which was an unprecedented presentation of pomp and circumstance in Canadian -- if not North American -- sport.

Yet the 2008-'09 centennial season missed one important piece: a winning season...a bridge to that long and storied history... a sense of connection to the lineage represented best by Maurice Richard, Jean Beliveau and Guy Lafleur...and of course the illustrious tradition of 24 Stanley Cups.

After finishing first in the eastern conference and reaching the second round of the 2008 Stanley Cup playoffs (before losing to the same Philadelphia Flyers), the Habs faltered badly during the Centennial season, finishing eighth and enduring the embarassment of a four-game sweep at the hands of their arch rivals, the Boston Bruins, in the first round. The very glory years that were being celebrated in 2008-'09 seemed so long ago.

These past two months in 2010, however, the players and the team ignited what the entire Centennial was designed to provide; pride of association, memories of yesteryear and what it felt like to be in the hunt for the trophy Canadian sports fans cherish most.

It's been 17 years since the Canadiens last reached the Stanley Cup finals and won. It could be another 17 years or more before they do so again. But Montreal's run in what Stanley Cup-winning head coach Mike Babcock calls a "marathon of hope" was a final touch this year to the 100th anniversary celebrations that was better than anyone in their front office could have scripted.

It has not only given the organization and its fans a sense of hope and optimism but a restored sense of identity for a team that, for the first time in its great history, has gone this long between championships.

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Business Tale of the Tape: Chicago and Philadelphia makes for solid Stanley Cup final

The end of the Montreal Canadiens' improbable run to the 2010 Stanley Cup finals means smaller Canadian audience numbers for CBC and dramatically lower ratings for RDS, but it makes for a solid showdown between two of the strongest American brands in the National Hockey League. And in that light, the championship round bringing together the Chicago Blackhawks and the Philadelphia Flyers is great news for the NHL's U.S. television rights holders, NBC and Versus.

It's a worthy follow-up to last year's Stanley Cup final between the eventual 2009 champion Pittsburgh Penguins and the 2008 winners, the Detroit Red Wings; the two most popular road teams in the NHL over the past three years.

There's no Sidney Crosby in this year's Stanley Cup final, but a quick look at the sport business tale of the tape pitting the Blackhawks against the Flyers suggests it might be the best U.S. match-up in at least a decade based on sheer hockey market strength:

Franchise valuation - According to Forbes Magazine, this Stanley Cup series showcases the fifth and seventh highest-valuated franchises in the NHL. Philadelphia is valued at $273 million US while Chicago comes in at $258 M (and rising as the hottest property in the NHL). In 2009, Detroit was fourth while small-market Pittsburgh was middle of the pack.

Overall revenues: It's a meeting between two of the top eight revenue-producing franchises in the NHL. After quadrupling their sponsorship sales since 2007, the Blackhawks are tied for sixth (with Boston) at $106 million US while the Flyers are eighth at $101 million.

Box office revenues: It's #3 (Philly) against #9 (Chicago), each driving well more than $50 million of their revenues at the gate.

Ticket prices: Philadelphia is top-five in the NHL (at $60.25) while seeing the Blackhawks at the United Center is still one of the best bargains in professional hockey at $46.80 (19th overall).

Home attendance: After ranking 29th out of 30 four years ago, the Blackhawks make the Madhouse on Madison the biggest building in the NHL, packing it with more 22,000 fans per game and leading the NHL in attendance for the second straight year. The Flyers average 19,503 at the Wachovia Center; sixth-best in the league.

Road attendance: This final brings together the seventh (Chicago) and 14th (Philadelphia) most popular teams on the road this season.

Media market size: In addition to Versus and NBC, the NHL's U.S.-based sponsors are smiling as they contemplate the third and fourth largest designated market areas (television DMAs) on the continent. Chicago is #3 and Philadelphia is #4.

Regional television audiences: Chicago and Philadelphia were two of the top five U.S. hockey television markets during the 2009-'10 regular season. The Blackhawks drew an average regional audience of 196,800 viewers on Comcast and WGN while the Flyers attracted 147,900. That's #6 and #11 overall in the NHL and #2 and #5 in the U.S.

Hockey market: Forbes Magazine's research suggests this is a clash between the fifth and seventh strongest hockey markets in the NHL and the third and fifth best in the U.S. (based on franchise value attributed to city and market size).

Simply put, the 2010 Stanley Cup final features two of the best marketed U.S. franchises in two of the best hockey markets in the U.S. When one considers both market clout and brand appeal, it's arguably the best U.S. match-up since the Flyers last reached the finals in 1997 against the Detroit Red Wings.

It also comes with important intangibles based on history and tradition: one is an Original Six franchise that hasn't won a Cup since 1961 and the other a first-wave 1969 expansion team that hasn't done so since 1975. It's that hunger -- shared by the respective organizations and their fans -- which will make for good storylines throughout the series beginning Saturday at the United Center.

And good stories make for good ratings.

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If Gary Bettman cannot see the opportunity for the NHL, someone else will

One of the principal jobs of the commissioner of the National Hockey League – or any professional sports league for that matter – is to create value for his member franchises and their owners. Commissioners do that by creating league-wide conditions that grow the business of their member clubs.

The more revenues franchises generate, the greater their business valuation. When more franchises make more money, the average value increases throughout the league and that is good news for NHL club owners in the same way rising home prices and growing ownership equity is a boon for home owners.

So when it comes to franchise values, we give NHL commissioner Gary Bettman credit where it’s due. Values have grown under Bettman’s 17-year tenure several fold.

The question for any seasoned business valuator -- or any fan who cares about the game for that mattter -- is, however, what could be?

When one considers where the league could be without the stresses -- both public and private -- surrounding a group of under-performing hockey businesses in the southern U.S., Bettman's record raises red flags and deserves further scrutiny.

That’s because every single one of the NHL’s major business indicators – attendance, ticket prices, box office, merchandise sales, sponsorship sales, television audiences and revenues – would be even higher if the league had less U.S. sunbelt franchises and more Canadian or northern U.S. franchises.

Why Bettman has not pro-actively addressed the issue is one of the big blind spots in his leadership of the NHL. Why the NHL’s governors – the owners of the league’s 30 clubs – have not pushed more aggressively for solutions that would strengthen the league and improve their own lots considerably is an even bigger mystery.

If it’s true that you’re only as strong as your weakest link, the Phoenix Coyotes are a problem for the NHL. So are the Atlanta Thrashers. Throw in the case of the Florida Panthers – where less people are watching on FSN Florida (an average of 13,400 viewers per game) than are attending games in person (15,000 on a good night) – and you have at least three teams mired in red ink in questionable hockey markets.

Why not play to your strength? Why not license your product in markets where it is being gobbled up in record numbers? Why not replace your weak links with solid performers?

“The Case for Canada” report outlines just how bullish the Canadian market is for the NHL brand of hockey, especially in the period since the lockout in 2004-'05.

http://www.vancouversun.com/sports/could+cash+return+roots/3060451/story.html

It suggests that if the NHL relocated three of its weakest southern U.S. franchises to Canada, their individual franchise values would increase by more than 50 per cent and the league’s average team valuation would jump by $11 million US. It also submits that the combined revenues of the three relocated franchises would rise by $100 million per year, average attendance would grow by 6,000 more fans per game per franchise (or 738,000 more per season) and regional television audiences would increase twenty-fold. Yes, twenty-fold.

Yet more than anything, the report by TheSportMarket.biz and The Vancouver Sun makes a compelling case for the landing of at least one more NHL team in Canada. Plain and simple, the numbers clearly show how the NHL, its member franchises, broadcast partners and other corporate stakeholders – not to mention fans of the game in Canada – would be well-served if the NHL shifted its centre of gravity northward.

The proof is in the pudding of the hockey markets themselves. Considering market size, demographics and other attributes including affinity for sports in general and hockey in particular (as Forbes Magazine does in its annual list of NHL franchise values), the average NHL market contributes $84 million to its franchise valuation (out of about $210 million in average overall value).

Sun belt markets are considerably weaker; the market attributes of Phoenix, Atlanta and Florida for hockey average out at only $48.3 million according to Forbes.com. That's about half the average U.S. hockey market value and about 40 per cent that of the average Canadian market.

Those numbers exemplify how the sunbelt teams are dragging down the average value of NHL franchises the way shabby houses devalue entire neighbourhoods.

The Case for Canada is clear. It’s your move commissioner Bettman.

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Steve Nash is to Canadian basketball what Gretzky was to U.S. hockey

They’re both Canadian sports icons. One is arguably the best player in the history of the National Hockey League and the game’s greatest ambassador in the United States. The other the best Canadian basketball player ever produced and the game’s face in Canada.

Wayne Gretzky was heroic in Edmonton and Canada and became hockey’s big thing in the U.S. Steve Nash is a big deal in Phoenix and throughout the U.S. and is an even bigger deal here in Canada.

In team sport in particular and professional sport in general, they will go down in history as among our country’s greatest exports.

Who is the bigger export presents an interesting debate. One could suggest Gretzky has the edge because he skated in the large markets of Los Angeles and New York and defined Canada most because he played hockey.

Others would point to the bigger footprint held by basketball in the U.S. and give the nod to Nash, saying his talent has been showcased on the larger continental stage of the NBA.

What is clear is that the two Canadians have served as the single most important ambassadors in their respective sports in their generations; with Gretzky popularizing hockey in the U.S. and Nash making basketball more relevant in his own country.

Nash is the most famous face of the Phoenix Suns franchise and has become one of the highest-profile players in the NBA on the strength of two league MVP crowns and the kind of durability and excellence which has led his team to the western conference finals against Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers.

Nash and the Suns are in tough against Kobe and the Lakers, who appear destined to reach their third successive NBA Finals and set up a rematch of the 2008 championship round won by the Boston Celtics.

Yet none of that reduces the Nash factor in Canada when it comes to interest in the NBA. When he plays – both during the regular season and especially in these playoffs when the Suns have been a going concern – Canadians pay attention. And that goes for sports editors and sports directors as well as fans watching on television.

When he doesn’t, we don’t. The NBA has been fortunate to score 175,000 viewers on TSN during these playoffs and hoops on Canadian cable television rarely crosses the 250,000 audience threshold. With Nash on the small screen, however, the average Canadian audiences should climb to north of 400,000 if the Suns can make things interesting in Phoenix.

It’s the kind of personal brand appeal – one shaped in part by his on-court talent and leadership and in part by his record of community investment, charity work and social activism – that is all too rare these days in professional sport.

It’s the kind of appeal that makes a great template for Canadian athletes and athletes the world over in any team sport.

It’s the kind of appeal that makes you understand how important Steve Nash is to Canadian basketball and wonder what kind of transformational impact he would have had on the game in this country had he been acquired by the old Vancouver Grizzlies or the Toronto Raptors at any time in his career.

Now that’s fantasy basketball worth considering.

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Quebec Flyers, BC Blackhawks and Canada Sharks each have their merits, but only Montreal Canadiens register economic impact in Canada

The San Jose Sharks have more Canadians on their roster than any of the four teams remaining in the National Hockey League's 2010 Stanley Cup playoffs.


The Chicago Blackhawks have the biggest bevy of British Columbians while the Philadelphia Flyers boast the most Quebeckers.

Yet despite having fewer Canadians than the Canada Sharks and fewer Quebecois than the Quebec Flyers, only the Montreal Canadiens have a macro economic impact on their city, their province and, by extension, their country.

Nine unanswered goals in a 2-0 series lead might suggest the Flyers will limit the number of home games left in Montreal, but the Canadiens will drive box office revenues of more than $5.5 million per game night at the Bell Centre after earning $25 million in ticket receipts from their seven-game series miracles over the Washington Capitals and Pittsburgh Penguins.

Add a half-million dollars in concession and merchandise sales per game and you have a winfall not only for the Habs, but for their official suppliers, licensees and the federal and provincial tax agencies.

Each televised game fills restaurants, pubs and brasseries in Montreal; each home game moreso. The beer flows and wings fly at sports bars throughout Quebec and across Canada, expanding the economic impact beyond the confines of the second largest city in the country.

The buzz is also economically palpable for CBC and RDS, who are generally doubling their audience numbers on the strength of having a Canadian team in the conference finals. When a combined average audience of more than six million Canadians watch Hockey Night in Canada and RDS -- almost one of every five Canadians -- it's good for those broadcast companies. Radio rights holders glean similar upside.

More eyeballs and ears following a Canadian team in the final four also means -- at least theoretically -- more returns on investment for domestic advertising sponsors such as Scotiabank, Tim Hortons and Golf Town.

So whatever your take is on what makes a local franchise take on national team status or whether the Montreal Canadiens have any right to your spring allegiance, make no mistake that they are the only team left registering an impact on the Canadian economy.

The Sharks, Flyers and the Blackhawks have varying degrees of fan equity in Canada, but love them or hate them, only the success of the Canadiens on and off the ice makes a tangible, financial difference for Canadians, Canadian broadcasters and other Canadian companies.

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Major League Soccer's Seattle Sounders FC ownership puts its money where its mouth is

From their inception and through their pre-operating period, opening season and well into their sophomore season in Major League Soccer, the Seattle Sounders FC have defined themselves as something special in North American professional sport.

Exhibit 1 is how they created an ownership group which blended the new (Hollywood producer Joe Roth, comedian and television star Drew Carey and former software mogul and financial titan Paul Allen) with the old (Adrian Hanauer, owner and operator of the incumbent USL Sounders). It gave the franchise seamless continuity with the city's USL soccer tradition and history while at the same time injecting it with economic, political and creative clout that is second to none in Major League Soccer.

Exhibit 2 is how they listened and responded to their constituents on the issue of the name and identity of the franchise. They abandoned their choice for a new name -- either Seattle FC, Seattle Alliance or Seattle Republic -- and embraced the clear favourite of Seattle soccer fans: the traditional Sounders FC designation.

Exhibit 3 is the democratic spin they've put on soccer operations management; a vehicle in which Sounders FC season ticket holders will have a voice in extending the initial contract of general manager Hanauer...or in voting for change.

Exhibit 4 is the authenticity of their fan experience; where Sounders shirts and scarves combine with band-led fan marches (Sound Wave) and other touches on match nights at Qwest Field to make it the closest thing to European soccer in North America.

Exhibit 5 is the most impressive marketing launch in North American expansion franchise history.

Exhibit 6 is an infrastructure provided by Allen's Vulcan Sports & Entertainment, the company which owns and operates the Seattle Seahawks of the NFL and markets and manages the Sounders FC.

Exhibit 7 is a dynamic community partnership between the Sounders FC and Washington State Youth Soccer.

The first-year results included a playoff berth as an expansion franchise and records in MLS attendance (north of 30,000 per game), sponsorship (including a five-year, $20 million shirt deal with Microsoft's Xbox 360), merchandising and regional television success. The second-year has picked up where the first ended, with crowds now eclipsing the 36,000-mark in an expanded seating manifest at Qwest Field.

Yet the ownership and management of the Seattle soccer club pushed the envelope to another level this week after the Sounders suffered an embarrassing 4-0 loss at home at the hands of the Los Angeles Galaxy. By Sunday morning, they had announced a one-game refund for all season ticket holders. It will come in the form of a credit against next year's season ticket charges.

It all came after one of the partners in the club looked around at his colleagues in the owners' suite and said if he was a fan, he'd want his money back.

Within 24 hours, Sounders FC season ticket holders had received word they would get the single-game credit as an acknowledgment of the sub-par team performance against the Galaxy and in appreciation of the support they had given the club since the announcement four years ago that MLS was coming to Seattle.

It was another example of the Sounders FC walking the walk and talking the talk. It was also quite simply a case of the team's ownership putting its money where its mouth is. Whether or not other ownership groups have the integrity to make similar moves in the months and years to come, the Sounders FC have made a resounding statement about the importance of season ticket holders to the most successful sport franchises.

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Vancouver 2010 a factor in strong television ratings for Stanley Cup playoffs

The parity that drove strong television ratings throughout the 2009-'10 National Hockey League regular season has found expression in the post-season, which included 49 games in the first round (with seven of eight series going at least six games).

Twelve overtime games helped produce great ratings for Versus and NBC south of the border and for TSN, RDS and CBC here in Canada.

The NHL numbers for round one of the 2010 Stanley Cup tournament still pale in comparison with those for the NBA on ESPN/ABC and TNT (about a third to a fifth of the size of the ratings sparked by Kobe and Lebron). Nonetheless, they represent solid growth for the NHL and give it much to crow about, especially with its U.S. broadcast partners and league-wide corporate sponsors.

NBC is up 18 per cent over 2009, to an average first-round viewership of 1.430 million and a rating of 1.1. Versus has seen a 35% spike in viewers, with a first-round average of 595,000. That's the most the NHL has gleaned on U.S. cable television since ESPN/ESPN2 drove 608,000 in 2001. The combined average of 742,000 is the most since ABC/ESPN/ESPN2 scored 750,000 in 2000. In addition, the various U.S. regional rights holders who simulcast alongside the national carriers have hit record numbers in 2010.

In Canada, where hockey and hockey television are kings, the CBC's Hockey Night in Canada is up 49% over last year and is riding its highest numbers since 2004, when a Vancouver-Calgary first-round seven-game series caused a television buzz. TSN is up 89% (growing from 567K in 2009 to 1.07 M in 2010). RDS is going wild on the wave of the Montreal Canadiens.

The numbers are up in part because of the parity and the overall strength of the markets involved in the first and second rounds. They are also higher because of the new Personal People Meter (PPM) measurement system deployed for the first time last fall (which most analysts suggest is responsible for a bump of up to 20%).

Yet make no mistake about another big factor in these terrific television ratings for the NHL: Vancouver 2010.

In Canada in particular, the Olympic Winter Games were a storyline for NHL fans since the Canadian team's training camp last fall. There was massive media and fan interest in the unveiling of the Team Canada jersey in October and in the announcement of the roster over Christmas. It just built from there and created the largest television numbers -- for sports and overall -- during Vancouver 2010.

Featuring the best players in the world on their respective national teams, the Olympics engaged NHL aficionados, brought back some old fans and attracted new viewers. That's true in both Canada and the United States, the two countries which squared off in a memorable overtime finale won by Sidney Crosby February 28th.

More than two months later, the afterglow of Vancouver 2010 is a contributing factor in this great TV run the NHL is enjoying in both Canada and the U.S. during its Stanley Cup showcase. And that is something NHL commissioner Gary Bettman should consider as he ponders Sochi 2014.

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The NHL's Chicago Blackhawks represent a remarkable turnaround...both on and off the ice

The on-ice turnaround scored by the National Hockey League's Chicago Blackhawks over the past three years is impressive. A five-season exile from the Stanley Cup playoffs ended last year and the Blackhawks red, black and gold colour palette is likely to be a going concern for much of the new decade.

Adept drafting, smart trades and a couple of prized free agent acquisitions have given Chicago fans a few reasons for both short and long-term optimism. After all, in the business of sport, nothing is more fundamentally important -- in most markets -- than the business of winning.

Yet the on-ice makeover is matched -- if not exceeded -- by the remarkable turnaround the Original Six franchise has achieved off the ice. In Chicago, product and marketing have met to create a one-two punch as balanced and lethal as that of any NHL franchise in the U.S. (See NHL Composite Power Rankings 2009-'10 http://www.facebook.com/thesportmarket?v=photos&ref=ts#!/photo.php?pid=3724749&id=280702824731)

The combination has taken the Blackhawks from second-to-last in NHL attendance in 2006-'07 to first overall the past two years.

The marketing part has been handled brilliantly by Blackhawks' president John McDonough (hired in November of 2007); fully-empowered by second generation owner Rocky Wirtz (who took over from his dad, the late Bill Wirtz the previous month) and complemented over the past two years by business operations senior vice-president Jay Blunk (January of 2008).

The Blackhawks are back and they're back on the strength of comprehensive, brand-based marketing; an integrated strategy in which the NHL's Chicago foothold is firing on all of the most important cylinders in business operations. Blackhawks marketing has at least 10 streams, none more important than the first three (product promotion, broadcast platform and sense of history):

1. Product marketing: Chicago has a good, young team and Blackhawks marketers make sure everyone knows that;

2. Broadcast marketing: McDonough and company understand the best way to expose their new product is through television and radio. WGN-TV, Comcast Sportsnet and WGN Radio are key partners in the off-ice turnaround because they've put the team back on the Chicago sports map. Regular season games draw sellouts of 21,000 plus to the United Center and almost 10 times that on television;

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=399165796504&comments&ref=mf#!/photo.php?pid=3769385&id=280702824731

3. Heritage marketing: The repatriation of Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita and Tony Esposito was not only long overdue, it brought back a generation of 'hawks fans who were as estranged as the former stars were over the span of three decades;

4. Partnership marketing: An NHL team in an American market can only benefit from aligning itself with the other professional franchises in the city. McDonough linked the Blackhawks with the Cubbies (his alma mater), White Sox, Bears and the Bulls, their United Center partners owned by Jerry Reinsdorf. The partnership approach culminated in the 2009 Winter Classic at Wrigley Field and made special event marketing part of the mix for the Blackhawks;

5. Cross marketing: The partnerships also set the stage for creative cross-promotions with the city's top stars in other sports. Even the campaigns that didn't make it to television -- most notably the 2009 series featuring the Blackhawks and da Bears that was banned by the NFL -- caused a stir on the web and in chat rooms, demonstrating the NHL team was prepared to ride the air baloon of their more famous football cousins;

6. Personality marketing: The Blackhawks are ultimately selling a team brand, but they know that team brand is defined in large part by the personal brands of their players. The team's star tandem on the ice, Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane, are the star tandem in television, radio and print advertising. Phase 2: Making Hollywood celebs such as Vince Vaughn part of the personality of the franchise;

7. Theme marketing: The simple and hockey-themed tagline One Goal, crafted by global ad agency Ogilvy Mather, has served as the Blackhawks' mantra for the past two years;

8. Entertainment marketing: The new Blackhawks have made hockey cool again. From opening anthems to goal celebrations, the United Center is the Madhouse on Madison. Just ask visiting teams stabbed with the Chelsea Dagger after every Chicago goal. Is there a more distinctive goal celebration song in the NHL right now? (See and hear The Fratellis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEXHeTcxQy4)

9.  Social media marketing: In the hometown and state of Barrack Obama, the Blackhawks are all over Facebook, Twitter and YouTube;

10. Cause marketing: The Blackhawks have always made money in Chicago. Now they're sharing the wealth and investing in causes that matter to the community. Just more reasons for Chicago to care about the Blackhawks.

Add it all up and you've got the best marketed franchise in the United States and one of the top three in the NHL. The Blackhawks have already been acknowledged as among the fastest-rising sports properties in the United States (see Champions of The Sport Market 2008 http://www.thesportmarket.biz/pdf/Champions_of_Sport_2008_International.pdf). With a solid on-ice product and dynamic off-ice marketing, don't count on them going away anytime soon.

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Legacy of 2006 FIFA World Cup powers Bayern Munich and entire German Bundesliga

On the field, Bayern Munich is basking in the spotlight of the UEFA Champions League. The most famous German soccer club has revelled in the world's biggest annual sports tournament, has reached the 2010 final May 22nd in Madrid and will square off against Internazionale Milan before the largest single-day sports television audience on the planet.

The re-emergence of Bayern Munich among the world's soccer club elite is part of a bigger story. It is a metaphor for the rise of the German Bundesliga it has represented so well in this year's UEFA Champions League.

Off the field, Bayern Munich leads the German Bundesliga in merchandise sales and team sponsorship -- powered largely by its T-Mobile shirt deal. It is second only to Borussia Dortmund in Bundesliga attendance, with crowds of more than 69,000 the norm at Allianz Arena in Munich.

With a league title in sight with the 36th and final round of Bundesliga play this weekend, Bayern Munich appears ready to regain the status it held in the 1970s, both on and off the field.

Yet it does so as part of a Bundesliga that is itself having a banner year. The German Bundesliga is now the number one European league in three of the most important categories of sport business: attendance, merchandising and jersey sponsorship sales.

Driven by a league-wide commitment to family ticket pricing, Bundesliga clubs are averaging around 42,000 fans per game. Powered by lucrative deals in the betting and energy sectors in Germany, Bundesliga shirt sponsorships this year rose by five per cent to a league-wide average of $10 million US (about $2.5 million US per club ahead of the Barclays English Premier League). Merchandise sales have never been stronger.

It is no coincidence to me that the Bundesliga has gained strength each and every year since Germany hosted the 2006 FIFA World Cup. In fact, the growing strength of the league is a direct legacy of that World Cup.

One only has to look at the spike in attendance at World Cup host cities such as Munich, Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen (site of the Veltins Arena that is home of Schalke), Hamburg, Frankfurt, Cologne and Stuttgart over the past five seasons to recognize the impact of 2006. http://www.thesportmarket.biz/podium_news2.htm

It all begins with the new stadiums and stadium renovations that were completed for the World Cup, upgrading the spectator venues in almost half of the Bundesliga's 18 markets. The honeymoon period for those new stadia and renos is still going strong. Yet the resurgence is also reflected in media, television, corporate and fan interest, fueled in large part by the third-place berth of the German national team that year and the first-hand exposure German fans had to the world's best players, more of whom are now playing in the Bundesliga.

Call it the World Cup lift. Four years later, it's still raising the bar for Bayern Munich in particular and the German Bundesliga in general. In some respects, it's shades of the last time the Bundesliga ruled Europe on the strength of Bayern's mid-1970s dynasty. That European champion did its best work in the years after the Munich 1972 Olympics and the 1974 World Cup, which Germany also hosted...and won.

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The NHL on television in 2009-'10: Canadian Bulls and Southern U.S. Bears

When more Canadians watch the NHL Draft Lottery on TSN (an average national audience of 556,000 this year) than Americans watch actual live game action during the regular season on Versus (averaging 297,000 in 2009-'10), it puts into perspective how the National Hockey League in general and NHL television in particular is a tale of two countries.

The NHL and the NHL on TV is hot in Canada. Not so much in the U.S., especially the further south you go.

Depending on how you look at it, Canadians are 10 to 20 times more likely to watch the NHL on TV than our American friends to the south. In a market 10 times the size of Canada, the NHL averages 1.6 million viewers on NBC during the regular season, less than the early game average of 1.8 million CBC drives through its Hockey Night in Canada franchise. Similarly, TSN (714,000) outperforms Versus (297,000) on cable, more than two-to-one in absolute terms and more than 20:1 per capita.

There's no better picture, however, of how different a proposition the NHL is in Canada compared to the U.S. than in the local and regional television ratings of the league's 30 clubs. Despite some good gains in the era of the NHL Winter Classic on NBC, the U.S. market is still a tough nut to crack for the NHL. If Canada is a rampaging bull market for NHL hockey -- which it is -- then the southern U.S. is a lame bear.

It's all mapped out in this week's Helijet Top Ten Bull Pen at http://www.thesportmarket.biz/ and www.Facebook.com/TheSportMarket (which lists the Top Ten, Middle Ten and Bottom Ten NHL television markets).

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We'll let the listing of regional television audiences in the NHL speak for itself. What we will do is give you our Top Ten takes on where the NHL is at in television in Canada compared to the U.S.:

10 - The top four television markets in the NHL during the 2009-'10 regular season were Canada's four largest media markets: Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary. They all trumped larger U.S. designated market areas such as New York, Los Angeles and Chicago;

9 - Six of the top nine regional television audiences in the NHL were held by Canada's six NHL franchises;

8 - The hottest U.S. NHL television market is Pittsburgh, home of Sidney Crosby and the defending champion Penguins. Fox Sportsnet Pittsburgh this year drove 93,000 households and 214,100 viewers per regular season game. Next in line are the fast-rising Chicago Blackhawks on Comcast Sportsnet and WGN TV (196,800 viewers per game) and the seemingly perennial Stanley Cup-contending Detroit Red Wings (186,500);

7 - There's parity on the ice but not in television ratings: the NHL's big three when it comes to regional television numbers -- Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Maple Leafs and Vancouver Canucks -- have larger audiences than the next 10 clubs combined (1,742,900 to 1,673,700);

6 - The Canadian regional television average audience is 383,167, which is more than two-and-a-half times the NHL average of 141,040 and almost five times the U.S. regional average of 80,508;

5 - The NHL's so-called Original Six franchises (Montreal, Toronto, Boston, New York, Detroit and Chicago) average 313,333 viewers per regional telecast. The last six NHL expansions average 34,583. The last six relocated franchises average 78,233 (but that drops to an average of 49,620 when you take out Calgary);

4 - The average Canadian NHL television market is more than 10 times stronger than the average U.S. sun belt TV market. And that's in absolute terms (383K to 34K);

3 - Canada's six NHL franchises draw more regional television viewers than all 24 U.S. clubs combined (2,299,000 cumulative in Canada compared to 1,932,200 aggregate in the U.S.). In fact, the top four Canadian teams (Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary) do that with 1,964,200 combined;

2 - It takes the NHL's bottom 11 television markets (cumulatively representing average viewership of 376,500 per game) to come close to matching the Vancouver Canucks' team average of 398,500 on Rogers Sportsnet Pacific. You have to add five more NHL clubs -- for a total of 16 or more than half of the league -- to rival the 650K plus regional averages of Toronto and Montreal (with the asterix that the Canadiens' regional rightsholder is RDS, a French-language national cable carrier);

1 - The Florida Panthers, playing before the smallest TV audiences in the NHL, have to log 49 regionally-televised games (1.2 seasons of home games or more than a half-season of total games) to match what the Toronto Maple Leafs or Montreal Canadiens each draw in ONE game.

When you rate the NHL's other bear TV markets (Atlanta, where it takes 36 Thrasher telecasts to equal one Habs game, or Tampa, Nashville or Raleigh, where it takes those teams 26 games to match the Leafs, or Phoenix, 25 games), it paints a picture that at some point the league will have to address: its southern U.S. plan in general and sunbelt strategy in particular.

When less people are watching your product on television than they are in-arena -- which is the case in Miami -- you have a fundamental problem. Not enough people care.

That's not the problem everywhere in the U.S., of course. It's not so much the issue in southern California, at least when the Ducks and Kings are winning. It's not a problem in the northern U.S. markets.  And, it's certainly not a challenge in Canada, where we drink the NHL on televison like we do beer.

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