The sports industry involves many complex aspects of business that interweaves sports-as-entertainment, the media, consumers, intermediaries and suppliers, and owners and organizations into the value chain path. Modern sporting events are akin to spectacle in the days of Ancient Rome when the Coliseum was filled with eager spectators drinking wine to watch lions against brawny Christian slaves. In other words, all societies routinely use sports as spectacle and entertainment. As Matthew D. Shank argues in Sports Marketing, “Regardless of whether we are watching a new movie, listening to a concert, or attending an equally stirring performance by Shaquille O’Neal, we are being entertained” (3).
The sports industry has been experiencing tremendous growth over the past two decades. This growth has been driven by sports marketing and the increasing media coverage of sporting events based on sports popularity among viewers. Satellite TV, Sports Networks like ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Classic and the traditional Networks’ efforts to compete with them provides consumers with hundreds of thousands of hours of sports coverage annually. Shank estimates that the sports industry generates $213-$350 billion per year in revenues (6). The Washington Redskins NFL franchise alone posts more than $220 million in annual revenues (Fisher 29).
Sports Marketing is the “specific application of marketing principles and processes to sports products” (Shank 35). Sports marketing principles are also applied to nonsports products associated with sports, such as the way Superbowl MVP’s advertising “I’m going to Disneyland” after the big victory. Sports organizations are basically entertainment providers in today’s sports industry. As such in order to retain competitive advantage in an increasingly competitive environment, sports organizations need to practice a marketing orientation. A marketing orientated organization aims to ac...