grodney
* Ace Member *
I eat Grape Nuts. With hot water. Effing delicious.
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PDGA need to get in bed with a sponsor like Red Bull
- Thread starter astomps
- Start date
I eat Grape Nuts. With hot water. Effing delicious.
Never happen.
No ROI.
Its not like we have a huge audience.
Red Bull sponsors certain activities because they use that as a form of advertising.
These threads are hilarious.
Imagine if Nike made discs and sponsored McBeth?
Its honestly just laughable the level of naivety.
I get wishful thinking, but maybe start off with something more realistic.
That would be Busch Light or Budweiser.
Always something awful.
You never see a Stella bottle laying on the ground.
After all these threads, and all sort of companies jumping on the slogan bandwagon I still have no answer to what "grow the sport" means and why we should do it.
Disc golf will likely never be mainstream, no matter how many people are playing it and that's okay with me. I play mainstream sports...I know the pressures of trying to find sponsors to cover your next meet, and the pain of letting them down when we don't succeed. I don't want that for disc golf. Disc golf should be a fun, communal activity. For those who take It more seriously, it should be you against the course, testing yourself and your skills without dollar signs in your eyes, hoping for a brief mention on ESPN.
Disc golf will likely never be mainstream, no matter how many people are playing it and that's okay with me. I play mainstream sports...I know the pressures of trying to find sponsors to cover your next meet, and the pain of letting them down when we don't succeed. I don't want that for disc golf. Disc golf should be a fun, communal activity. For those who take It more seriously, it should be you against the course, testing yourself and your skills without dollar signs in your eyes, hoping for a brief mention on ESPN.
Toro71
* Ace Member *
Wait, so, cliff diving has a 'huge audience?' OK. I guess they sponsor it because of the millions of eyeballs watching.
Stay classy.
Wait, so, cliff diving has a 'huge audience?' OK. I guess they sponsor it because of the millions of eyeballs watching.
Stay classy.
No, but it is extreme. With the chance for danger and death.
People will watch that.
That and they can cover their costs there with sponsoring NASCAR and basketball players.
Disc golf doesn't have that.
Stay naive.
Wait, so, cliff diving has a 'huge audience?' OK. I guess they sponsor it because of the millions of eyeballs watching.
Stay classy.
Go to YouTube and type "Cliff Diving" and sort by views. The third most viewed video is from the Red Bull cliff diving finals with over a million views.
Red Bull is all about the exciting, death-defying sports. Their sponsorship (or in some cases, creation) of these events basically amounts to hiring stuntmen to perform insane feats that most people wouldn't even dream of attempting, all as a Red Bull advertisement.
That's the identity they've built as a brand: dangerous and exciting. Disc golf is about as far from that as you can get.
My take?
It's to make themselves feel legitimate.
I think it comes down to inadequacy issues. They never fit in, never sat at the cool table, never hit a walk-off and had the team waiting at home plate, I don't know, something is missing. Maybe they were never loved? Due to this they feel the need to push whatever niche they found into the mainstream to gain acceptance.
I don't want the sport to stagnate, but I don't want it to be the X games either.
jrawk
* Ace Member *
exactly how much does Red Bull give to cliff diving? If there's any sport cheaper than disc golf, i bet it's cliff diving. FWIW, If i tried, i can go to the local beverage distributor, get them to give me 2 cases of Red Bull and a Red Bull Banner to use at my local dg tournament. There ya have it.
That and they've ingrained an athlete worship mentality from watching too much televised sports over the years, and just automatically assume that if you're talented at handling a particular ball, or a puck, or a race car, money is going to just drop in your lap. Absolutely no concept of how those established sports got to where they are, nor any notion that talented doesn't always equal marketable, which is what sponsors want.
Just read this post...how does this help the sport? The biggest problem IMO in the sport is the poor maintenance on all of you all's local courses. Broken signs, bottles, graffiti, unkempt fairways, signage, dangerous design. Scares away beginners that end up never playing again. The PDGA should focus on supporting disc golf communities and educating park departments. If a basketball or tennis net is broken...it is replaced quickly at any respectible park. That is not so with disc golf damage. I am unsure how giving the top 20 pro's even more money that should stay local to fix up local courses benefits anyone.
Maybe the exposure brings more people out? To what...people turning every tee sign distance # into 420 or visualizing private parts in every knot on wood benches...then using a sharpy to make the visual come to life? I think we would be better off with a tazer sponsorship then hiring people to taze course destroyers and buy string trimmers.
Maybe, but I doubt it. Though, admittedly, I have to insights into their motivations.
When I was much younger and had working knees, I loved to play basketball. Backyards and playgrounds and gymnasiums, against all sorts of competition. But I also loved watching basketball on TV, seeing it played at a higher level than I could imagine achieving, and being entertained by the drama involved.
Why can't disc golfers want both?
Now, personally, I'd just about rather watch the test pattern than disc golf on TV, even though the test pattern died away decades ago. But I can certainly see why others might desire it, without having to presume and belittle their motives.
I hit someone with a disc in a practice round...been stung by a bee and once while looking for a disc another person accidently sappling whipped me in the face as I was following them. That count...I felt extreme.
Kind of...there is a level of consistency that has not been met by manufacturers that we deserve... more global visibility and potentially buyout would put more focus on the actual quality of what they produce for us.
We have BINGO.
It doesn't have to be about the national/international corporation being the sponsor, the local distributor is all you really need to start with. I would bet a fair amount of money that those in this thread that point out that big companies "used to" sponsor disc golf are probably confusing what were actually sponsorships from local distributors and/or franchises for sponsorships from the larger corporation.
Just as an example, if you look at a lot of the USDGC's promotional stuff (posters, programs), there is a Coca-Cola logo amongst the sponsors. From that, you might infer that is THE Coca-Cola corporation that sponsors the Olympics and advertises all over TV. But in reality, it's simply the local Coca-Cola distributor in Rock Hill. Still Coke, but not the one that could potentially funnel thousands if not millions of dollars of support into the sport were they so inclined. But maybe if relationships are maintained and nurtured, bigger things can grow out of these little ones.
That's the really frustrating thing about threads like this that start with a suggestion of what "they" (PDGA, regional/local club, TDs) should be doing to get brand X involved in the sport. It all starts with you. Go to a local distributor (hell, write a letter to corporate if you want). What's the worst that happens, that they say no thank you? If enough local distributors or franchises of larger corporations are giving some support, maybe corporate HQ starts to take more notice. But it isn't going to happen overnight and it's never going to happen if people are content to sit on their hands and wait for "someone else" to do something.
Same thing with that overflowing trash can. Few people take the responsibility to act themselves...
ZAMson
^Has PhD in Disc-Artistry
You mean like, to empty it, or to start throwing frisbees into it and getting on ESPN?
JC you've been playing nearly as long as I have, so you know you first dig at me is not true. Budwesier, when they were first coming out with Bud Light was THE corporate sponsor for the golf portion of the World Frisbee Championships for many years, and you can still find Budwesier stamped discs on eBay and elsewhere. Conversely, right when Climo was starting his monster run, Wendy's, the corporate entity, NOT a local franchise, sponsored several disc golf and ultimate Frisbee tournaments, including a large tier in with their kids meals. So trying to belittle me when I put out two solid examples doesn't work.
However, the rest of your post is well thought out and brings up great points, and I agree with it completley. Let's take the Red Bull example. If TDs/Clubs start with getting stuff from a local distributor, and it keeps moving up the chain, eventually the brass at Red Bull will hear of it and at least consider throwing some sponsorship behind a major event.
It will take awhile, of course, because corporations do lots of research before throwing money at something, especially something like disc golf. But you are dead on with your point: if people want change, they have to start it themselves, and on their level.
However, the rest of your post is well thought out and brings up great points, and I agree with it completley. Let's take the Red Bull example. If TDs/Clubs start with getting stuff from a local distributor, and it keeps moving up the chain, eventually the brass at Red Bull will hear of it and at least consider throwing some sponsorship behind a major event.
It will take awhile, of course, because corporations do lots of research before throwing money at something, especially something like disc golf. But you are dead on with your point: if people want change, they have to start it themselves, and on their level.
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Just light it on fire, and jump it as you throw doused in gasoline...then we would be able to call disc golf a "sport" and ESPN would cover it on NYE.
That's the thing with these "blow it up big time" folks. The overwhelming majority of them want the desired result (although I doubt many of them have thought out the why on that), but very few of them are willing to do the legwork to make the desired result happen.
Same goes for people who start threads on here providing a link to an online petition wanting meaningless online signatures from people five states away in support of a new course, but won't go door to door locally with an actual petition that might actually carry some weight with a governmental body, because you know, that involves them getting up from their computer.
