As promised, here's a more complete explanation of the billboard project I mentioned in the "People are Reacting" thread.
I believe this project presents an interesting opportunity. Unfortunately, I believe it's also an indictment of the profound dysfunction that permeates various parts of our athletic department and (in this case specifically) our marketing group.
Last December when we were in the throes of trying to get Jaydn Ott to return to Cal for his final season, a few members of the football staff (who are awesome) and a few donors and I came up with the idea of putting billboards into select major ACC markets (Atlanta, Charlotte, Miami, Dallas, Boston, etc.) to advertise the team. Concept was we could start off advertising Cal football to the ACC (using Jaydn and maybe Fernando in Miami and a few others in their homes towns) and then transition that into a Heisman campaign for Jaydn if he blows up on the field like we all think he could. Hope was we could generate some hype for the program going into this absolutely critical make or break season. Cal will be "new" to the ACC this year and this year only. So we needed to strike now.
Beauty from Cal's standpoint is we thought we could raise funds from alumni in these markets to fund this and it would be essentially free for Cal. We had a very generous donor lined up already who agreed to cover Atlanta. We had a few other leads in other markets. We thought we could use this project to allow Cal to reconnect with these alumni and remind them of how Cal athletics was coming to their homes. Win/win. Plus it would help demonstrate to the world that Cal was serious about revitalizing its football program and making a splash. Cal has 4.9m views (and counting) on its post painting the ACC logo on to its field. The most views of a Cal football post ever. People are interested in this story and what it says about college football writ large.
Only thing (literally the only thing) our marketing group needed to do was find a billboard company and give us a price so we could fundraise for it. That was it. And that was seven months ago. During those seven months they made it abundantly clear that they could not possibly be less interested in this project. But we now finally have a quote for two digital billboards in three markets (Atlanta, Dallas and Miami) for a three month campaign. Of course marketing has given us zero information on where these billboards would be located in those markets (high traffic? low? near a sports stadium?) or how many other ads we'd be sharing the billboard with (where we one of three? One of 100? ). We still have to nail those details down, but assuming they check out I think we now at least finally have enough information to move forward.
If someone reading this likes the idea and wants to adopt an ACC market, please drop a line to Adam Brooks in Cal Athletics Development (atbrooks@berkeley.edu). Adam is terrific and I know he'd love to hear from you. I think cost for a market would be about $75k for the three month campaign, or more precisely about $27k per city per month. If any of these numbers sound feasible to you then jump in here.
I'd love to show Cal marketing that we can in fact get this done; I've seen the script football came up with and it looks great. To forestall the question though, much as Cal would appreciate $500 or $1,000 donations that's not where we are. We can't run a GoFund me for something like this and, as I've said before, folks often overestimate how many of you want to jump in with relatively small donations. I deeply appreciate you all, but there just aren't enough of you. Goal is for Cal to win enough games so the next time we want to fund something like this with a bunch of smaller donations there would be enough of you; but that day is not today.
This billboard project has at least been engaging in that it's reminiscent of the things I used to work on for Cal sports before NIL ate my life and all my money. These projects are gratifying since they are very tangible and specific. But I have to note that completing them just treats the symptoms and not the disease. Random alums should not need to push and pull and scream to get stuff like this done. The professionals who are handsomely paid by Cal to do these things need to get them done. And we all need to just show up to games and clap. That's our job.
I have told Chancellor Lyons that there needs to be a significant culture shift in terms of how the University and our administrators views our athletics department. We badly need people in our administration who understand part of their job is to get to "yes" and to find ways to help Cal win. Decades of this rot needs to cleared out if we want this program to survive and that needs to happen yesterday. But in the meantime, those of us on the outside can still make a difference. This is one of those ways.
I believe this project presents an interesting opportunity. Unfortunately, I believe it's also an indictment of the profound dysfunction that permeates various parts of our athletic department and (in this case specifically) our marketing group.
Last December when we were in the throes of trying to get Jaydn Ott to return to Cal for his final season, a few members of the football staff (who are awesome) and a few donors and I came up with the idea of putting billboards into select major ACC markets (Atlanta, Charlotte, Miami, Dallas, Boston, etc.) to advertise the team. Concept was we could start off advertising Cal football to the ACC (using Jaydn and maybe Fernando in Miami and a few others in their homes towns) and then transition that into a Heisman campaign for Jaydn if he blows up on the field like we all think he could. Hope was we could generate some hype for the program going into this absolutely critical make or break season. Cal will be "new" to the ACC this year and this year only. So we needed to strike now.
Beauty from Cal's standpoint is we thought we could raise funds from alumni in these markets to fund this and it would be essentially free for Cal. We had a very generous donor lined up already who agreed to cover Atlanta. We had a few other leads in other markets. We thought we could use this project to allow Cal to reconnect with these alumni and remind them of how Cal athletics was coming to their homes. Win/win. Plus it would help demonstrate to the world that Cal was serious about revitalizing its football program and making a splash. Cal has 4.9m views (and counting) on its post painting the ACC logo on to its field. The most views of a Cal football post ever. People are interested in this story and what it says about college football writ large.
Only thing (literally the only thing) our marketing group needed to do was find a billboard company and give us a price so we could fundraise for it. That was it. And that was seven months ago. During those seven months they made it abundantly clear that they could not possibly be less interested in this project. But we now finally have a quote for two digital billboards in three markets (Atlanta, Dallas and Miami) for a three month campaign. Of course marketing has given us zero information on where these billboards would be located in those markets (high traffic? low? near a sports stadium?) or how many other ads we'd be sharing the billboard with (where we one of three? One of 100? ). We still have to nail those details down, but assuming they check out I think we now at least finally have enough information to move forward.
If someone reading this likes the idea and wants to adopt an ACC market, please drop a line to Adam Brooks in Cal Athletics Development (atbrooks@berkeley.edu). Adam is terrific and I know he'd love to hear from you. I think cost for a market would be about $75k for the three month campaign, or more precisely about $27k per city per month. If any of these numbers sound feasible to you then jump in here.
I'd love to show Cal marketing that we can in fact get this done; I've seen the script football came up with and it looks great. To forestall the question though, much as Cal would appreciate $500 or $1,000 donations that's not where we are. We can't run a GoFund me for something like this and, as I've said before, folks often overestimate how many of you want to jump in with relatively small donations. I deeply appreciate you all, but there just aren't enough of you. Goal is for Cal to win enough games so the next time we want to fund something like this with a bunch of smaller donations there would be enough of you; but that day is not today.
This billboard project has at least been engaging in that it's reminiscent of the things I used to work on for Cal sports before NIL ate my life and all my money. These projects are gratifying since they are very tangible and specific. But I have to note that completing them just treats the symptoms and not the disease. Random alums should not need to push and pull and scream to get stuff like this done. The professionals who are handsomely paid by Cal to do these things need to get them done. And we all need to just show up to games and clap. That's our job.
I have told Chancellor Lyons that there needs to be a significant culture shift in terms of how the University and our administrators views our athletics department. We badly need people in our administration who understand part of their job is to get to "yes" and to find ways to help Cal win. Decades of this rot needs to cleared out if we want this program to survive and that needs to happen yesterday. But in the meantime, those of us on the outside can still make a difference. This is one of those ways.
