Rick and Red Continue Marketing Efforts after 204-Day Lockout

Rick and Red Continue Marketing Efforts after 204-Day Lockout

February 5, 1999

The NBA's marketing effort to rehabilitate the game's image in the wake of the 204-day lockout continues tonight when Rick Pitino and Red Auerbach speak directly to Celtics fans from the FleetCenter floor immediately after introductions of the starting lineups for the season opener against the Raptors. Pitino and Auerbach are expected to tell the fans that their continued support is crucial and to draw a link between Celtics tradition and the newer version of the team. "We couldn't have two better communicators to talk to our fans," said Stuart Layne, the Celtics' executive vice president of marketing and sales. "But I think that the tone of everything this team and this organization has done since the lockout was over is to tell the fans how much we need them and how they are the absolute key to our success."


 So far, the enormous emphasis on embracing the fans appears to have paid dividends. The Celtics front office says the rate of ticket sales for the shortened 50-game season has exceeded their expectations. Celtics officials said the box office has tallied three sellouts to date: a game against the New York Knicks Feb. 26 and both games against Larry Bird's Indiana Pacers March 28 and April 19. The Celtics' brass is hoping for two more quick sellouts, with the opener tonight and tomorrow's game against the Cleveland Cavaliers doing well, Layne said. First-day ticket sales this year fell only 3,000 short of the volume for last year, he said. On the first day of sales before the 1997-98 season - Pitino's debut, with all the attendant hoopla - 17,000 tickets were sold. On Jan. 24, the first day of ticket sales this year, 14,000 were sold. "We are absolutely ecstatic at that response," Layne said. "It's really exceeded our expectations.

"I think a few things we have going for us is that this is really the time of year, after the Super Bowl, when the NBA season kind of kicks in, anyway. And I don't really think the other three franchises in Boston are competing for attention. The Bruins are really underappreciated in an unfortunate way, and the Red Sox haven't really captured the public's imagination in this offseason. "And, of course, Rick Pitino provides a real base of fan support." Leaving nothing to chance, even one of the team's prime sponsors has pitched in on the rehabilitation job. Citizens Bank's strategy has blended the need to restore a positive image of the NBA with the bank's goal of capitalizing on its sponsorship of the Celtics, a five-year deal industry sources value at about $1 million annually. Among other strategies, Citizens helped sponsor the Celtics' barnstorming trips to Manchester, N.H., and Providence, two cities where the bank does substantial business.

And throughout the season the bank will sponsor more than the usual schedule of public appearances by Celtics players. "They've been a real bear to schedule because of the practices and the shortened schedule," said Arlene Fortunato, vice president and director of public affairs for Citizens. "But it really furthers our sponsorship while offering the Celtics an opportunity and venues for them to do what they feel they need to do after losing part of the season: get the players out into the community more often, in closer contact with the fans." The marketing strategy in Boston very much mirrors that around the league, NBA officials say. "In the post-Michael Jordan era, and after the work stoppage, we want to get back to why people like the game," said Rick Welts, the NBA's marketing chief. "That's why you are seeing a lot of fan-player interaction. We have an opportunity to come out of this better than we went into the lockout last June, and that is a big part of the plan."