Northwestern doesn’t have trouble getting enough prospective students to fill out applications, but when it comes time to fill stadiums, the Wildcats struggle.
Ironically, the same factors that create a brochure-maker’s dream also produce a sports-marketing nightmare.
For the brochure, there is NU’s glowing academic reputation, with the country’s third-largest city right next door. For the sports fan, there is competition in one of the country’s most prestigious athletic conferences.
Yet the scores of empty seats at NU sporting events are glaring. In trying to improve attendance, NU’s athletic marketing department must walk a fine line between advertising an academic and athletic institution. It also has to fight for fans in a professional sports market and compete with schools more than six times its size.
NU’s challenges are not necessarily unique – Stanford knows all about being stereotyped as an elitist academic institution, and Miami (Fla.) is hurt by the city’s plethora of professional sports. Just ask Wake Forest or Vanderbilt about being a small private school in a major athletic conference.
But the combination of these three obstacles puts NU in a class of its own.
‘A Double-Edged Sword’
Balancing sports and school isn’t just a challenge for student-athletes. Like many top-tier universities, NU tries to promote its intellectual prowess without being stereotyped. But NU has not yet succeeded in this endeavor.
“We are, first and foremost, an academic institution,” said Chris Boyer, NU’s assistant athletic director for marketing. “Our research shows that might hurt us in terms of reaching the everyday fan, but at the end of the day we have to market the school as what it is.”
The loyalty that state universities receive simply for their location is often lost on private schools, said Bob Carruesco, an assistant athletic director at Stanford. Just as NU’s fan base is diluted by Illinois, the Cardinal sees locals cheering for California and UCLA. And Vanderbilt’s hometown of Nashville, Tenn., is dominated by Tennessee fans.
This pattern has occurred largely because fans can feel alienated by the private schools’ highbrow reputations.
“There is a demographic in parts of the city that feels they’re not welcome at Vanderbilt,” said Owen Shull, assistant athletic director at Vanderbilt. “It’s understandable because it would probably be hard for some of them to come as students for financial reasons. But if they feel they’re not welcome as a fan, that’s absolutely not true.”
Academically, one of NU’s main selling points is small class size – NU gives out about 2,000 bachelor’s degrees annually, compared to more than 10,000 at Ohio State.
But this results in fewer alumni and a smaller fan base for NU athletics down the line.
According to Boyer, NU tries to stimulate interest in its football team among recent graduates with discounted tickets and other promotions, but the base of the problem is the scarcity of graduates.
So while smaller classes and a No. 12 ranking by U.S. News & World Report helps sell NU to prospective students, it doesn’t help sell many tickets.
“It’s a double-edged sword,” Carruesco said. “You certainly enjoy the reputation, but on the other hand, you have to live with it, too.”
a saturated market
Not only is Chicago a cultural hub filled with museums and theaters, it’s home to professional football, hockey, basketball and soccer teams and two professional baseball squads. So Chicagoans don’t need to look as far as Evanston for a team to support – especially if NU’s teams aren’t successful.
“If Northwestern isn’t winning, maybe the Bears are or the Cubs are or the Blackhawks are or the Bulls are,” NU Director of Athletics Rick Taylor said. “The Bulls are down, so where does that money go? Maybe it goes to a boat on Lake Michigan, or maybe it goes to the Lyric Opera or maybe it goes to the art museum.
“This isn’t a one-dimensional town. There’s only so much money to be spent, and there’s a lot of people after that disposable dollar. You’ve got to put as good a product on the field as you can.”
And while NU would benefit immensely from being one of Chicago’s “hometown teams,” the school has historically been associated more with the North Shore than with the city.
But this fall NU is hoping to capitalize on what it considers a huge opportunity.
As construction on Soldier Field forces the Chicago Bears to play in Champaign, NU wants to be the team to fill the football void left in the city. Armed with the tagline, “While the Bears are away, the Cats will play,” NU is aggressively seeking a new Chicago fan base.
“We see the Bears leaving town as a unique market opportunity,” Boyer said. “We want to market to some people that probably would have spent their entertainment dollars (at Soldier Field).”
To this end, NU has launched a huge advertising campaign, mostly via print and direct mail. According to Boyer, NU is advertising extensively in the Chicago Tribune and the Daily Herald, and the school recently sent out mailings promoting the availability of football season tickets to roughly 160,000 people. The effort will be supplemented with radio commercials throughout the summer. But there is no telling if the newly recruited fans will remain once the Bears return to town.
Some schools in similar markets have decided to work with their local professional teams instead of around them.
“A big hurdle to filling seats is that we have the 49ers, the Raiders, the Giants, the A’s, the Earthquakes (of MLS) and the San Jose Sharks,” Carruesco said. “All of these are within 40 miles of our campus. So we’ve tried to team up with some of the professional teams to do joint promotional stuff. There’s no reason people can’t be fans of both.”
conference competition
In the heart of Chicago’s Lincoln Park, there’s a lot of school spirit brewing – but not for NU.
In fact, upon entering one bar on North Lincoln Avenue – about 10 miles south of NU – it would be easy to think you were smack in the middle of East Lansing, Mich.
Spartan green and the big S are everywhere at The Gin Mill, and according to manager John McHugh, the place is packed any time Michigan State takes the field, court or ice.
“There’s a lot of Michigan State alumni that comes for all the games,” McHugh said. “If they’re playing another Big Ten school, we’ll get a couple tables for that school, but they’re always drowned out by the Michigan State fans. Everyone’s in green and white.”
The Gin Mill is one of two Michigan State-themed bars in Chicago. NU bars? Not one.
Graduates from other Big Ten schools gravitate toward the biggest Midwest metropolis and remain loyal to their alma maters. These fans might help pack the stands at Ryan Field or Welsh-Ryan Arena for one game a season, but it’s unlikely they will become part of the NU faithful.
A similar problem persists for Vanderbilt. Tennessee football rules the market throughout the state, but Vanderbilt is trying to cozy up to the graduates of other Southeast Conference schools that reside in Nashville.
“Tennessee certainly dominates the fan support in football,” Shull said. “We’re challenged a little bit by all the SEC schools. Come their football game, those people always come out of the woodwork. They may root for (another team) that day, but we’re hoping they have a good time, come back and root for Vanderbilt the next time.”
Shull said Vanderbilt football struggles to draw a crowd for several reasons, mainly because the team hasn’t had a winning season since 1982.
Although the Cats have occasionally contended for Big Ten football and men’s basketball titles, their traditional struggle to compete in the conference has hurt their marketing potential.
“Once you’ve been the conference doormat for so long, it’s hard to build up rivalries,” Boyer said. “We’ve been more of a homecoming game than a rival until very recently.”
NU achieved most of its success in sports that bring in considerably less revenue – golf, swimming and tennis, for example. Unfortunately, none of those sports has much of a market, es
pecially in the chilly Midwest.
Even Vanderbilt, which benefits from a warmer climate, has difficulty promoting such sports.
“It’s tough because there really isn’t a market for the sports that we’re best in,” Shull said. “We can’t find (a market for golf, swimming or tennis) in Nashville, and I’m sure you can’t find it in Chicago.”
But with the improvement of the revenue sports, NU is surprising even itself.
“I go into hat shops across the country, and ever since the Rose Bowl year, you find our hats where you never used to find them,” Taylor said. “Michigan is the biggest brand-name apparel college in the country, but I can’t and don’t want to control perceptions. All I want to do is produce the best possible programs, and perceptions will run their own course.”
According to Boyer, NU’s sports marketing department has a more concrete goal in mind.
“We want to get to the point where every basketball game is sold out, and three-fourths of the people are wearing purple instead of three-fourths in orange and blue.”
