Fighting Irish Out of the Fight?

Notre Dame: the name itself represents times gone by, a legendary football club with names like Knute Rockne, Ara Parseghian, and Lou Holtz.  However, in today’s money market, legends are forgotten and new names are called.  Some would never dare compare Longhorn football to the classic elegance of Notre Dame, but when it comes to network deals and winning seasons, the luck of the Irish seems to have run out. 

Notre Dame football is the school’s only sport showcased on NBC, the football team being an independent team that doesn’t intentionally overshadow conference teams or smaller brands like the Texas Longhorns do because, well, they’re it.  In June 2008, NBC renewed its television contract with Notre Dame through the 2015 season, with the 2010 contract reported to be worth $9 million a year.  Losing games translates into declining viewers, and although not a huge expense compared to its other agreements, NBC is now finding the deal with Notre Dame hard to justify.    

UT football is the unofficial mafia leader of the Big 12, taking advantage of its size and blanketing weaker brands like Baylor and Iowa State.  The rest of the Big 12 family has been written out of the will entirely, forced to stand by while its powerful big brother takes over the estate.  The much anticipated Longhorn Network provides coverage of all Longhorn athletes and guarantees the school $300 million over 20 years, revenue that is pocketed directly into the already deep pockets of the University.  However, any network proves useless if it’s unavailable to its viewers.  DirecTV spokesman Robert Mercer stated, “We understand Longhorn has other programming that may be of value to a small segment of our customers, but two UT football games do not constitute a network."

Perhaps the one thing Notre Dame and UT have in common is a small viewing audience, albeit for two different reasons.  Notre Dame needs to figure out how to win on the field, and UT’s Longhorn Network has to prove itself worthy of being picked up by accessible providers. 

Business exists to make a profit.  Ethics aside, the Longhorns know money, they understand the value of their brand, and every move is strategic.  With approximately 90% of the football team being native Texans, fans are plentiful and loyalty abounds.  If ESPN and UT can effectively promote their product to national and accessible providers, we won’t even be writing about the sustainability of the Longhorn Network when renewal time appears. 

For Notre Dame, however, the green leprechaun is still in the room.  Considering the facts – last year’s Army game only pulled a 1.0 Nielsen rating among 18- to 49-year-old viewers with CBS crime reruns stealing the votes, Notre Dame has finished its season ranked 10th or higher just three times in the 17 years its home games have been televised on NBC, and with NBC’s, or rather Ebersol and Schanzer’s track record of fighting for the Irish – Notre Dame will be divorced from NBC in 2015.  Notre Dame’s warriors within NBC have abandoned ship, and with ratings and wins still declining since the last renewal in 2008, a third chance to renew in 2015 will be revoked.  Mediocre isn’t worth millions.             

My prediction: Notre Dame will join a conference, relish in the past, and hope for a better future.  Their followers aren't extinct yet, but most are watching if nothing better is on, or if Notre Dame is playing a notable opponent.  Considering their performance during the Michigan State game, the best time to watch is at the very end of the 4th quarter. 

   

Come. Sit. Conquer.

Who says you have to work in a cubicle where your ideas soon become as stale as the company coffee and your cube-mate likes to eat all-things-garlicky and then talk about how pathetic his love life is?  If that sounds like your day at the office, Grind Spaces is a breath of fresh air.

What:  "A members-only workspace and community dedicated to taking all of the frustrations of working the old way and pulverizing them to a dust so fine it actually oils the wheels of the machine."

Why:  “Grind was built for free radicals who would rather work in a community than a company.”

You have a space that is open from 8 a.m. to midnight, you’re surrounded by interesting people (that you obviously have at least one thing in common with), and you’re immersed in a new work environment that is arguably not even a “work” environment at all.  Thankfully for me, agency life can provide this same springboard for creativity (which is why advertising is so shiny), but I fear that some employees in other industries see their job as just a job rather than an opportunity to let loose and produce pretty things. 

Of course this space isn't suitable for the masses, but how refreshing it would be for many souls to ditch the monotony of office life and hang out in a cool space with cool people, simultaneously producing clever, innovative ideas.  Change your environment, change your life?  Quite possibly so.

Lovely isms:
“If it ain’t broken, make it better anyway.”
“Love what you do or do something else.”
“Nobody’s ever won a rat race.”

Does size matter?

Mark Pollard, SVP and Director of Planning Innovation at Saatchi and Saatchi and CEO of Stealth Magazine, voiced the following:

The big idea versus small idea debate is dumb.  In reality, there are only ideas and "some thoughts I've had."  He defines an idea as "the bringing together of things that don't normally exist together in a way that makes better, more useful sense. An idea is the output of this act."  A changing world calls for changing ideas.  From a planner's perspective, ideas should be in the strategy from the very beginning.  Whether they're big or small shouldn't matter, what matters is, is any of this good? 

Why you shouldn't limit your ideas (according to Pollard):
1. If you're a planner and you're not putting ideas into strategies, I really don't understand what your role as a planner in an agency is. The role is supposed to be about the un-obvious made poetic and compelling.
2. Ideas (big and small) should be riddled into everything; a new twist or turn can be added to all executional elements.
3. The more I do this job, the less I believe in one strategy; execution makes strategy live or die. More rapid and earlier exploration of multiple strategies and creative ideas together is something worth exploring.

"The big idea versus small idea debate is not worth having - I truly hope it disappears so we can focus on the power of great thinking - and making it happen as often as possible."

My turn:
Size doesn't matter.  There may be an initial idea that is affectionately called "The Big One," but if you look at the entirety of a campaign, from its conception to its execution, smaller ideas are only added to "The Big One", increasing it's size but, more importantly, improving its quality.  The "big idea" is a springboard, a rocket launcher, a slingshot.  The "small ideas" keep it flying. 

When the BIG idea talks:

It says to clients, “Rest assured, I will not lead you off a cliff.”

It says to consumers, “I know the brainpower it took to make you tweet about how great I am.”

It says to agencies, “Build on me if you want to look really smart.”

The BIG idea isn’t something to be tossed aside because it does have a reassuring voice, but when coupled with a war-worthy strategy and smarter, albeit smaller ideas, it turns into the Goodyear blimp.