Despite Trend, Athletic Departments Resist Ads

Spectators at major Division I sporting events have grown accustomed to corporate advertising and promotions, from halftime contests awarding free dinners at local restaurants to ads placed strategically on scoreboards.

Recently, corporate advertising during athletic events has become commonplace in the Ivy League as well.

Men's hockey fans at Dartmouth's Thompson Arena are showered during intermissions with coupons for local businesses.

One lucky fan at each Brown hockey game is given a chance to shoot the puck across the ice. Score a goal, and he or she wins a prize donated by a local establishment.

The one exception is Harvard University, which has steadfastly refused to allow any corporate sponsorships or advertising during its athletic events.

"We're very different from every other university in the country," says Stephen Staples, Harvard's assistant director of marketing and promotions.

Harvard and the other Ivy League schools disagree strongly over the necessity and effectiveness of sports advertising.

Harvard has always frowned on corporate sponsorship, and with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) gigantic coffers, the athletics department can afford to be coy.

Representatives from many other schools--including Dartmouth and Princeton--say they need the corporate advertising to sustain their athletic programs.

As other schools join the corporate bandwagon, University officials have become critical of these schools, saying they have abandoned "pure sports" for no good reason at all.

Where's the Dough?

Athletic department officials at other schools do not hesitate to say that the decision to allow corporate advertising at their schools is first and foremost about one thing--money.

"People are looking around and seeing how much it costs to run these broad athletic programs, and they're looking for creative ways to pay the bills," Charles Yrigoyen III, associate director in the Countil of Ivy Group Presidents, an umbrella organization for the Ivy League says. "If money were not an issue, then our schools would maybe avoid advertising totally."

In fact, Ivy athletic department representatives say that revenue from corporate advertising is critical for the survival of their programs.

"To compete with a large school and what they put up, it's crucial for every small Division I school to have a key marketing department and play a large role in producing enough money to support the department and the sports in it," says Trevor Carlson, Dartmouth's interim assistant director of marketing.

"Advertising helps make our events better," says Katie Finkbeiner, Princeton's assistant director of athletic marketing and development. "It's extra revenue that we don't have."

An Untested Principle

Staples says Harvard's decision not to engage in corporate sponsorship in sports is purely a matter of principle, although he knows that some schools need a corporate presence in their sports program to survive--making all matters of principle irrelevant.

"There's a lot of schools where corporate advertising is a necessity," he says. "They have to do corporate marketing in order to compete."

But Staples says only schools in major athletic conferences are in this type of situation. He says no Ivy League school is currently in a financial situation where advertising is necessary.

Harvard's principled stance is--at the very least--made easier by financial security. The Athletic Department receives $12 million last year from FAS.

"[FAS] probably puts more money into the sports program than any university in America," says John P. Reardon, the executive director of the Harvard Alumni Association and a former Harvard athletic director.

But if that money were taken away, or if potential revenues from corporate advertising suddenly skyrocketed, Reardon says Harvard would have to closely examine just how important its principle is.

"It you're put into a corner where you need revenues, then you have to consider revenues. And if Coca-Cola offers you a million dollars a year to put a sign on your scoreboard, you'd have to have a debate about that."

"I tend to think that at the end of the debate, the Coca-Cola sign wouldn't go up," he added.

To Each His Own

While all the Ivy league schools besides Harvard have accepted corporate sponsorship, many have rules that restrict the location and appearance of the advertising.

"Each school has its own policies as far as what they allow and don't allow," says Yrigoyen.

Harvard technically has a small corporate presence in its athletic department. The University allows plain print advertising to appear in its game programs, and sells commercial time during official school radio broadcasts of basketball and football games.

However, Staples says Harvard makes these exceptions only because of tradition--advertising has existed in these programs and radio for decades, and he says the revenue from this type of advertising is insignificant.

Of the Ivy schools that officially accept corporate sponsorship in sports, Princeton takes one of the most conservative approaches.

Finkbeiner, the school's assistant director of athletic marketing and development says that the school has a "bare minimum" of advertising.

Only a certain degree of corporate presence is allowed in each venue, and all advertising must be in the school's colors of orange and black.

"We want to make sure that our venues aren't too commercialized, and we want to preserve the Princeton tradition and not have too much corporate or commercial influence," Finkbeiner says.

Princeton even places strict conditions on the type of sponsors it accepts. Finkbeiner says corporations such as Burger King or Pizza Hut are not allowed to advertise. She says the school limits itself to banks and financial institutions that fit the affluent Princeton fan base.

Dartmouth lies on the opposite end of the advertising spectrum.

The school was late to join the corporate advertising movement, but when it did join, it wasted no time in taking the lead in corporate involvement.

"Our advertising has been a lot for an Ivy school in the past few years," says Carlson. "It used to be almost zero, but in the past three years it has boomed."

Dartmouth's aggressive approach toward sports advertising is the brainchild of Brandon McNeil, the school's sports marketing head until late last year. Carlson says McNeil single-handedly made Dartmouth a leader in corporate promotions.

In fact, Carlson says McNeil might be the person most responsible for making advertising so widespread across the Ivy League. His 1997 arrival coincided with a general commitment to more advertising throughout the League, causing the Ivy League office to rewrite its guidelines on corporate athletic sponsorship.

Most Ivy League schools, however, do not approach Dartmouth's involvement in the corporate world.

"Compared to the rest of the big-time collegiate world, we're still a very conservative group," Yrigoyen says.

Reardon says Ivy League schools are likely to embrace advertising even more in the future.

"The trend is for even more commercialization and even more intensity in the advertising programs," he says.

Friends of the Program

As Ivy League schools break with tradition and embrace a corporate presence in athletics, alumni could prove to be major voices of dissent.

Staples says concern over how alumni would react to corporate tie-ins at athletic events is a major reason Harvard has kept its anti-corporate policy.

"There's no doubt that alums want sports to be presented from a pure approach," Staples says. "They like the fact that there's no signage. I don't think they want that to change."

Yet other schools say that alumni concern over sports advertising has ranged from sparse to virtually nonexistent.

"The older alumni might have had some complaints as far as taking away from the true sport of the game, but most people agreed that what Brandon [McNeil] had done was phenomenal for Dartmouth athletics," Carlson says. "The alumni have grown past that now."

Even officials from conservative schools such as Princeton and Yale say they receive little more than a single complaint a year from an alum about sports advertising.

In fact, Yrigoyin says alumni opposition to sports advertising will soon become a non-issue entirely.

"There's definitely a segment that would like to see it the way it used to be," he says . "But I think that kind of thing will change as the years go on, because young people who go to sporting events are so accustomed to seeing blatant advertising in games."

Filling the Seats

Officials at Ivy schools besides Harvard say that their athletic department's decision to advertise is not just based on money--fans are entertained by the corporate promotions and tie-ins.

"We're able to create a more fan-friendly environment at our games," Carlson says . "Without advertising, it would be a kind of bland, morbid setting. It would be just a sport being played for the athletes rather than for the fans as well."

But Harvard officials flat-out reject the idea that corporate promotions can add to fan enjoyment.

"Does it really make it more exciting to sit in a bowl game and have to hear every fifteen minutes that Frank's restaurant is waiting for you outside of the game?" Reardon says.

Staples says that Harvard's policy is actually the most effective in attracting spectators to school sporting events.

"I think our policy helps us attract people," he says. "People get tired of going to Celtics games and being inundated by P.A announcements and corporate logos. They think it's too much."

"We've heard people say they like to come to our events," he added. "It's so pure, it's the way sports ought to be."

Staples says other schools might try to use corporate advertising to increase attendance--but only if they have weak athletic programs.

"I think there is this goal if you don't have a strong product," he says. "Businesses usually rely on other promotions if their product is not strong enough to attract people on its own."

"Harvard has a strong product," he says.

--Staff Writer Elijah M. Alper can be reached at alper@fas.harvard.edu