On the latest episode of JohnWallStreet Presents: Big Business on Campus, a college sports podcast powered by Playfly Sports, JohnWallStreet Founder Corey Leff and Playfly Sports Chairman Michael Schreiber sit down with University of Utah Director of Athletics Mark Harlan and Crimson Brand Partners CEO Matt Webb.

In this 50-minute conversation, the four discuss:

Integrating Campus and Athletics Creates an Unmatched Brand Proposition

Most universities sell campus and athletics partnerships through separate units, which forces brands to work across multiple stakeholders and pits departments against one another for the same marketing dollars. Utah’s integrated approach enables it to package the full reach of the university and its sports teams into a single compelling proposition that even the professional clubs in the state cannot match.

“Let's take the Wi-Fi category. If [a school is] talking to anyone in the telecom space, [those companies] want to talk to students, they want to talk to faculty, they want to talk to the campus, and that would be one group over here historically. Then they want an athletics partnership and that would be [another] group over here. It's really tough to navigate those worlds, and what it really does is create competition internally where one group oftentimes wins and the other loses,” Webb said. “Whereas we're able to go and present the entirety of the campus…. You're talking about 16 to 20 million interactions that a brand can have with people that call the university home, whether they're fans, alumni, they're coming here for a doctor's visit or [for] work. That creates such an efficient marketing solution that really the pro side can't [even] provide.”

Particularly, once a marketer begins to drill down on who those people are.

“You're talking about students, 18-to-25, which is such a coveted cohort. You're talking about fairly well-to-do faculty and staff, medical professionals. You're talking about young families,” Webb said.

Prioritizing Reinvestment and Flexibility in a PE Partnership

Much of the hesitancy surrounding the potential influx of private equity into college sports stems from fears that investors will extract value from athletic departments rather than reinvest in their growth. But Crimson Brand Partners was conceived as a build, not the cost-cutting exercise associated with the asset class.

“We've got some pretty intense Capex plans. We're building a staff. We're bringing in outside vendors who are experts in their areas to make sure that we are maximizing the fan experience and [not only] shortening your line at the concession stand but [ensuring] when you get to the front of the line it's [not a cheaper hot dog, it’s] a better hot dog,” Webb said. So, “that's a bit of a misnomer. The way that we're structured allows us to really lean in.”

However, Utah did preserve the flexibility needed to change course should the partnership fail to progress as envisioned.

“We're going to have a lot of optionality when this [relationship with Otro] is over,” Harlan said. “Maybe we take [the equity] back. Maybe they move on [and] we keep this great staff and just figure out a different way to do [commercial operations]. But we left it wide open. We also wanted to make sure whoever comes in next [as an investor] is the kind of partner that we currently have now, and we certainly put in some safety [clauses to ensure] that.”

Local Integration Distinguishing School-Level Patch Partnerships

The Big 12’s patch partnership with Monster Energy creates incremental revenue for member schools. It also doesn’t interfere with the individual institutions’ efforts to sell remaining patch inventory as they tend to target a separate pool of sponsors with a differentiated offering.

“At the local level we're able to integrate a brand not just on the jersey, but into the entire story of what we do. They're interwoven into the fabric of who we are as a university and how we go to market. So, the story that we are presenting to potential partners is vastly different [from] what the Big 12 [or another conference is offering],” Harlan said. Investing in a school “is about how you engage with the community. It's about the stories you tell, the players that are impacted by [the brand or partnership]. That's really what we're presenting to potential partners. [A] conference [doesn’t have] that ability at the local level. They can cast [a] wide net but not dive in [as] deep.”

📺 Watch the full video on JohnWallStreet’s YouTube Page. 
🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

We’ll be back with the next episode of JohnWallStreet Presents: Big Business on Campus on September 3. Syracuse University Director of Athletics Bryan Blair will be our guest.

Previous episodes of BBOC, including sit-downs with Big East Commissioner Val Ackerman, Arizona AD Desiree Reed-Francois, Maryland AD Jim Smith, American Commissioner Tim Pernetti, Pittsburgh AD Allen Greene, Wake Forest AD John Currie, Kansas AD Travis Goff, Ivy League Executive Director Robin Harris, Big Sky Conference Commissioner Tom Wistrcill, SMU AD Damon Evans, Ohio State AD Ross Bjork, West Virginia President Michael Benson, Weatherford Capital Founding Partner Drew Weatherford, IMG Academy CEO Brent Richard and USA Fencing CEO Phil Andrews on the Enrollment Cliff, Mountain West Commissioner Gloria Nevarez, Pac-12 Commissioner Teresa Gould, St. John’s AD Ed Kull, Army AD Tom Theodorakis, Alabama AD Greg Byrne, Clemson AD Graham Neff, Rutgers University Director of Athletics Keli Zinn and Scarlet Knight Enterprises Chairman Oliver Luck, DePaul University AD DeWayne Peevy, and East Carolina University AD Jon Gilbert can be found on JohnWallStreet’s YouTube channel.

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📺 Watch the full episode on JohnWallStreet’s YouTube page.
🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

The next episode will be released on Wednesday, August 26.