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American Soccer's Urban Renewal
By Nate Baker
With fast, exciting play, and an electric atmosphere, the match became an MLS classic – proof that Major League Soccer had real potential and a strong rebuke to critics who doomed the young league.
But for MetroStars fans their team’s second home match of Major League Soccer’s inaugural season started with much less promise. Colombian midfield magician Carlos Valderrama pulled the decisive strings as his Tampa Bay Mutiny roared out to an early 3-0 lead.
The Metros struggled to find rhythm in the second half until against the run of play, MetroStars striker Giovanni Savarese scored two goals in three minutes. Savarese soon added another brace; an overhead volley that left a rain soaked 38,000 fans in wild celebration.
For over a dozen years area soccer-mad fans hungered for exciting top-flight action and for the most part, they got it. But after several years they left, replaced largely by a smaller number of less vocal young families. What happened?
GreenPitch examines the team’s fall from grace, their attempt to cash in on the youth soccer boom, and what lies ahead for the “Red and Black” of New Jersey.
In a bid to establish a “grassroots” following, Major League Soccer’s MetroStars have since abandoned their core audience and largely resorted to marketing gimmicks in an attempt at building brand loyalty with suburban youths and their families. Lost in the shuffle are young adults already interested in soccer and those who want a team to follow on a weekly basis. Research has shown that this local core of current and former players, expatriates, and others are now drifting away from the team’s grasp.
Members of the MetroStars front office staff admit that the team heavily targets the suburban youth soccer community. The market has experienced rapid growth in recent years, and according to MetroStars former General Manager Nick Sakiewicz, now represents the second largest population of youth players and organizations behind basketball. Team officials are banking on the interest of the metropolitan area’s 500,000 easily accessible youth soccer players.
Outreach programs include the Score at the School program, currently in place at approximately 25 local school districts. In the program, the team gives away MetroStars book covers, posters, bookmarks, and videos. Teachers monitor student progress, and kids who achieve goals in the classroom win tickets for themselves and their families. Before home games, the field at Giants stadium is made available to local youth teams that purchase blocks of tickets.
"We’re getting them out to the game, getting them to see our product … but also giving them a very unique experience of being able to play on the pitch at Giants stadium,” said Canetti. “We do dozens and dozens of appearances in the community throughout the year, with our MetroMobile vehicle, which is set up for sound, video, music, giveaways, prizes, games. In 2004 we did over 250 player appearances."
As a result, on Metros game days, Giants Stadium, to the dismay of many adult fans, is overrun with youth players, mainly boys. “As a proportion of total spectators on any given match day, youngsters seem to predominate,” said Marc Bernarducci, the chief officer of MetroNation, a MetroStars fan club
The MetroMobile, a red and black van which opens to an X-Box station and blares hip-hop music from its retractable speakers, circles the parking lot. From promotional tables shiny young co-eds hand out family discount tickets and other giveaways. There are games and clinics.
This season, the MetroStars sponsor the Metro SoccerFest, held inside the Giants Stadium practice bubble. SoccerFest, which opens three hours prior to every home game, is described as “a free interactive soccer carnival for children ages four to sixteen.” It features numerous soccer-related activities including the national “Dribble, Pass and Score” competition, soccer inflatable toys, and other soccer related games.
Despite the promise of such campaigns (Metros FC, the team’s official youth fan club signed over 400 members in its first four months), overall team attendance has recently plummeted.
This season, the team is averaging 11,402 fans per game, excluding figures from the England-Colombia doubleheader held in May (that match drew 50,807 people). Unfortunately for the MetroStars only a fraction of those fans remained to watch the team take on the Chicago Fire in the second match.
By including the 50,807 in its official attendance statistics, the MetroStars can claim to have officially drawn 15,342 fans this year — below the 23,898 fans per game average the team drew in its inaugural season, but more than this year’s official league average of 15,190 f.p.g. For purposes of attendance, Major League Soccer does not differentiate between doubleheader events and single-event league games. Of the 53 doubleheader games sponsored by MLS in its ten-year history, the Metros hosted 13, including some of the best attended ever — seven of the 14 best-attended games in league history were effectively turned into MetroStars home games for purposes of official attendance.
Once statistics are adjusted to exclude doubleheader events, the MetroStars have lost fans every year since 2001. That year, the MetroStars averaged 17,815 fans in non-doubleheader games (20,806 fans officially attended). In 2002, the team’s true average: 16,051 (officially 18,148 fans attended), followed by 15,822 fans in ’03 and 15,494 fans last season (officially 17,195 fans attended). This year’s unofficial average of 11,402 fans could see the team hit bottom. (In 1999, the Metros unofficially averaged 11,903 fans). “We’re not where we want to be with ticket sales,” said Canetti.
The former Vice President of Marketing does not allow this to detract from his long-term mission, which is to build a foundation of young fans who are passionate about the team and who can then hand this passion down to their children.
“All of our marketing is a long-term process,” said Canetti. “We’re trying to build fans for the future. We’re trying to get them at a young age, to get them to love the red and black of the MetroStars. We want to get them to grow up loving our team. And eventually become season ticket holders, purchasing our merchandise, logging onto our web site, watching our broadcasts on television.”
“All of our marketing is a long-term process,” said Canetti. “We’re trying to build fans for the future. We’re trying to get them at a young age, to get them to love the red and black of the MetroStars. We want to get them to grow up loving our team. And eventually become season ticket holders, purchasing our merchandise, logging onto our web site, watching our broadcasts on television.”
In Canetti’s view, the MetroStars and MLS, now in their tenth year, are at a unique disadvantage to traditional American sports such as baseball, basketball and (American) football.
“… When you look at some of the storied teams, whether it’s a soccer team or an American sports team like the Yankees or the Giants…those teams have had years of existence in the marketplace to build fans,” said Canetti.
Faced with this competition, according to Canetti, the MetroStars opt to target potential customers while they are at their youngest and most impressionable. “The theme is based on pride and passion…the whole campaign is geared around trying to build that pride and passion into the marketplace, into our fan base ... If we don’t win the championship we still want that pride and passion to be there.”
But there is no proof that this passion, assuming the front office is able to create it, will translate into long-term success for the team and the league. In the early Nineties, many teams embarked on similar campaigns. Clubs targeted suburban youth and families with give-away items, mascots, and clinics. After experiencing a short-lived boom in the mid Nineties, many Minor League Baseball teams in the Northeast were unable to attract sustained interest. Some have folded. Incidentally, from 1997 to 2000 Canetti was General Manager of Minor League Baseball’s now defunct New Haven Ravens.
According to many passionate Metros fans the youth-oriented marketing strategy poses many problems. “Young fans generally view match night more as a social opportunity than for really watching and appreciating the match,” said Bernaducci. With such fans, there is what Bernaducci calls the “inertia of ignorance” to overcome. “Simply, these folks are not necessarily knowledgeable enough to appreciate fully the mystique of the game,” he said. “Thus, these people need to be enlightened. This is a significant undertaking…”
If attendance trends are used to gauge success, the team’s fan base is headed in the wrong direction. Perhaps the Metros’ marketing staff simply lacks the necessary soccer-knowledge to make it happen.
According to Sakiewicz, the marketing team consists of approximately 20 staffers and makes up more than half of all MetroStars employees. Two have played soccer professionally. Sakiewicz was not sure exactly how many had played organized soccer at all. “Based on the quality of our staff games, I’d say that six or seven could play a good game.”
Perhaps as a consequence, the club’s youth marketing efforts do not push the actual product on the field.
“What eight year old kid wants to sit through an entire soccer game?” asked Jarrod Zimmer, a MetroStars sales representative who manned one of the booths in the Giants stadium parking lot before a recent home game. “It’s about the experience.” Zimmer said that he has never played organized soccer. |
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“Most of the people that come from overseas are 10-15 years behind the American sports business model and we don't find too many people up to the standard of sports executives that come from the leagues in the U.S.,” Sakiewicz said. “Frankly there is a recent push by clubs overseas to recruit American sports executives to help the cause overseas.”
Few top-flight professional soccer teams from such large regions as New York draw as poorly at the gate and even fewer would ignore an entire demographic. Surely this doesn’t make much business sense.
According to Canetti the adult demographic is scattered, unorganized and elusive to advertisers and marketers alike.
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GreenPitch examines the team’s fall from grace, their attempt to cash in on the youth soccer boom, and what lies ahead for the “Red and Black” of New Jersey. |
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“We can find the youth soccer players,” he said. “When you’re talking about 18-25 year old adult men, that’s not an easy group to reach. It costs a lot of money to try to reach an audience like that. And even if the team were to decide to target the young adult audience more aggressively, it would not even know where to begin. Where do you go? Where do you find them?”
According to Canetti, the MetroStars reach amateur adult players. To this end, the MetroStars recently teamed up with the American Cancer Society to host an overnight soccer tournament at Giants Stadium. The tournament, held in June, fielded adult teams from age 18 and older.
“The tourney was run pretty smooth after starting a little late and they seemed to have a lot of people around to help,” said Drew Faherty, president of Central Park Rangers F.C., an adult club from Manhattan.
But overall, Faherty and other officials with area adult teams and leagues said they only had limited experience with the MetroStars. Faherty’s relationship was limited to the overnight tournament and brief contact with a group sales representative. “A few years back one of our players was in contact with someone in the group sales office [who] was trying to arrange some bus trips for us.” He added that this correspondence soon fizzled out. Peter Strumpf, president of the Cosmopolitan Soccer League, New York City’s largest adult amateur league, said he never received any direct contact from the MLS or from the MetroStars organization. “We have received promotional mail over the years and I am sure some of our clubs did as well,” said Strumpf.
“You would think they would want to reach out more to the local clubs, especially with poor attendance,” said Faherty. “Maybe Alexi will change this.”
Perhaps as a move to shake team management, the MetroStars named Alexi Lalas, the former US defender, known for his trademark red goatee and his swashbuckling defensive play, as team General Manager. In his first press conference, Lalas indicated this strategy would change.
“We have to understand that in our rush to tap into the youth soccer market, we have neglected an entire generation of soccer fans that have grown up with MLS soccer as part of their sports culture,” he said.
When asked to elaborate, Lalas released the following statement through a MetroStars spokesperson. “Adult soccer leagues, college campuses and corporations are being stocked with a generation that has grown up with MLS soccer as part of their sports culture. We need to get in front of these folks and offer them the same sport, but with a more adult experience. They must recognize the social aspect of a night out at the stadium and therefore we must provide them with an alternative to a night out at the movies, a concert or a bar.”
Neither Lalas nor his spokesman responded to requests for further details. Lalas could find that the challenge is more difficult than he imagined. Adults still fail to get the message.
MetroStars gave free tickets to players who participated in the overnight tournament and many players did not attend. “A bunch of us had free tickets to see the MetroStars … I think only a few went,” said Yuval Lion, of Central Park Rangers.
“My guess is that there isn’t a great interest in the MLS or MetroStars among our club members. The talk at our games and practices is usually about the leagues in Europe.” Lion, who grew up in London, said he follows the English Premier League. “I find it hard to get excited about the MLS.” Lion has never attended a MetroStars game but attended the England/Colombia match in May. And like the vast majority, Lion and his teammates, did not stay for the MLS match afterward.
Perhaps he didn’t see the MetroGirls - a team of eleven young women fitted in skin-tight black pants and red halter-tops emblazoned with the MetroStars logo. The MetroGirls act as attention getters for teenage boys and young fathers.
“The MetroGirls are more designed to hit that audience,” said Canetti. The MetroGirls’ role is loosely defined as “brand ambassadors,” he added. “They market the MetroStars and are helping to spread the word…they’re at all the games but more importantly they’re out in the community … they’re in bars.”
Reviews of the MetroGirls have been mixed and, as might be expected, largely split down gender lines.
“While I once cringed at the idea of having cheerleaders at a soccer match … England fans were drooling over the MetroGirls during their visit to America. It made me think twice,” said Bernaducci.
But Beverly McDaris, an eight-year season ticket holder was unconvinced. “The only positive — if you can call it that — I see is, from the men arguing about which one of the girls is the hottest. The stadium atmosphere is at its best when the game is exciting, not when young women in sexy clothing stand in front of people and say, ‘Let's go, Metros’.”
When knowledgeable adult fans do attend games, many can be disappointed with the experience. “I went a few weeks ago and I regret it,” said Brian Lee, owner of Curva Nord, a soccer store in Manhattan. Lee appreciated the on field action but loathed the atmosphere.
“It was just ridiculous,” he said. “Nobody concentrates to watch the game.... most were kids with their parents and it seems like they didn't know what was going on, on the pitch.”
For Lee, an avid fan of Italian soccer who spent much of his youth in Europe, the front office deserves the blame. “You can totally see how the organizers don't pay any attention to the sport,” he said. Specifically, the stadium’s P.A. overpowers the songs of more vocal fan groups like MetroNation and Empire Supporters Club. “I can see five people trying to sing and create a European atmosphere but the [stadium] rock music drowns it out. It’s not only that, they don't let you bring a single handbag in but they let you bring that ridiculous horn in.”
The three-foot horn, sold at Giants Stadium concession stands is one of the most popular items on Metros game days. So much so that vendors recently doubled the item’s price, from $5 to $10.
“[The horns] are incredibly popular, of course, only with kids, who repeatedly blast them into the eardrums of those poor adults sitting in front of them, making it impossible for those same adults to enjoy the soccer game they paid to see,” McDaris said.
For many adult fans such as Bernaducci and McDaris, the MetroStars fail to reach the adult market because the organization is preoccupied with youth.
“Youth soccer leagues should be marketed to as one segment of the potential fan base, not as the primary fan base,” said McDaris. “The adults buy the tickets, are the season ticket holders … I would think the overall goal is to bring in revenue, and that revenue comes from ... adults who love soccer. The kids will grow up, move away, support other teams…but the adults are here now. And the Metros need revenue now.”
“I think the Metros front office has overlooked this important group,” said Bernaducci. “The adults are the revenue source, and the Metros front office must overtly acknowledge this by providing an offering that caters to this spectator segment with tremendous potential in the present.”
Recently GreenPitch picked the brains of soccer fans at the soccer friendly sports bars throughout the tri-state area (such as Manhattan’s Nevada Smiths). GP asked punters how they would improve Major League Soccer. The most popular response: An MLS team should sell the advertising space on the front of its uniform. It’s an interesting proposition. The move would make money and could legitimize an MLS club in the eyes of fans around the world. Sakiewicz even supports the idea. “I think it is a standard in the game of soccer across the globe and a very important commercial asset for the team to generate revenue from,” he said. But like many things in MLS, Sakiewicz’s hands are tied. The league controls the sale of the jersey as commercial inventory, he explained, so MLS would reap the rewards. Calls to Dan Courtemanche, Vice President of Marketing for MLS, were not returned.
Indeed the structure of MLS, with all teams under league ownership, presents a formidable challenge. A team in a large metropolitan market could not increase its budget—on marketing or player acquisitions—without league approval.
The Metros’ front office, in the meantime, will take its victories where it can. “I think the MetroStars have come a long way in a short period of time in establishing brand identity, recognition in the marketplace,” said Canetti. I remember when I came here five years ago, people were still asking questions: What are you? Where do you play? Those questions are pretty much gone.”
Are they?
-2005-09-07
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