Sports and Special Events Marketing

ARC: Connections: SIGs: Sports and Special Events: Business

A short commentary by a SportSIG member on sports business topics. If you are interested in contributing, please contact Vassilis Dalakas, dalakasv1@nku.edu

Thanks, Tonya

By Lynn R. Kahle, James H. Warsaw Professor of Sports Marketing,
Warsaw Sports Marketing Center, University of Oregon

In January, 2005, the U.S. Figure Skating Championships were held at the Rose Garden in Portland, Oregon. More than 100,000 spectators attended the event, and the $849 Gold Blade all-event passes sold out in less than 40 minutes from when they first went on sale. Michelle Kwan won the women’s title again, establishing that she is not just the Princess, but the Queen, of U.S. Figure Skating. She will continue to reap the benefits of being the premier athlete in this popular sport.

This event reminded many Oregonians of our most famous local woman figure skater and former Olympian, Tonya Harding. She was one of the main reasons that nearly half of the television households in the U.S. watched the Women’s Figure Skating Short Program at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Norway, one of the highest-rated television broadcasts of any type of all time.

Most people believe that Tonya Harding was responsible for arranging to kneecap her rival, Nancy Kerrigan, just prior to the Olympic trials, thus increasing interest in the Olympic event. U. S. Figure Skating itself, as an organization, upheld the high road when ultimately it banned Tonya Harding for life because of her “clear disregard of fairness, good sportsmanship, and ethical behavior.” Thus, even someone who dislikes Tonya Harding could still like the governing body of the sport.

At the very least, the Tonya Harding/Nancy Kerrigan incident did not hurt US Figure Skating. The year before the incident, the U.S. Figure Skating Association had about 110,000 members, and now it has 173,000 members. . This year the U.S. Figure Skating Association will host 1300 events. The US overall leads the world in Figure Skating Olympic medals, and the success of the home team in general should both result from and provide an advantage in the growth of the popularity of a sport. Figure skating’s television and sponsorship situation is enviable for a sport of its scope. The success of figure skating, however, goes beyond the normal explanatory mechanisms. It is difficult to isolate how much impact any one event from a complex universe of events has on an entire sport, but certainly the devastating consequences that some doomsayers predicted from the Harding/Kerigan event did not materialize. Almost certainly the event boosted figure skating.

The sport received a tremendous amount of publicity because of Tonya Harding. Vanna White supposedly once philosophized that she does not care what people say about her as long as they spell her name right. The implication is that in our celebrity-crazed society, bad behavior can fade but fame endures. Reality is not quite so simple, but Vanna White is at least partly correct.

Figure skating obtained additional fame from the extensive coverage of Tonya’s behavior, moving from the sports page to the front page of local newspapers across the country. Interest grew in figure skating because of this widespread publicity, and some of that interest translated into long-term fans becoming committed to following the sport. The 1994 Olympics featuring Nancy and Tonya had a soap opera subplot that rivaled the athletic subplot for audience attention. People who only cared about the soap opera subplot watched figure skating in unusually high numbers that year. At least some of them became fans of the athletic side of the sport.

Right after the scandal broke, U.S. Figure Skating signed a very attractive deal with ABC
(and importantly today, ABC’s corporate mate on the cable side, ESPN) for a long-term television deal, which at the moment extends through 2007. ABC obviously sniffed something in the scandal and its surrounding circus that smelled like good television. With ABC aggressively promoting the sport, the predictions of success almost became self-fulfilling prophesies. The Ladies Free Skating competition in the Salt Lake City Olympics, ironically broadcast on ABC’s rival, the Olympic Network NBC, received an almost unbelievable 29.0 rating and 42% share. These numbers reflect the tremendous enduring popularity of televised figure skating.

The incident did give figure skating an expanded image. Prior to 1994, ladies’ figure skating seemed to be a princess factory, with ever more attractive young girls being whisked into royalty through a fantasy of grace and beauty. Tonya Harding’s episode underscored a different image involving thugs, crime, star-crossed romance, and over-the-top competitiveness. All of a sudden the little princess had a godfather. Some Americans like subplots with criminal twists or at least Schadenfreude explanations of success and the successful. Maybe some of these suburban sweethearts were more complicated than a Disney plot. People who liked a different story line suddenly found something to enjoy in figure skating. Princess Tonya morphed into the wicked witch of the west. Some people declared the princess nothing but “white trash.” Because of the new growth of fan interest in the different subplots of a skating competition, the fan base grew. Many fans stuck around because they liked what they saw—not just little princess athletes, but vicious competitors with shady supporters and the full range of characters.

The psychology of news media coverage is simple. The news media like to report events that break out of the ordinary. “Little Princess wins figure skating competition” is a nice story headline, but “Figure skating kneecapping” definitely breaks the mold for what readers expect. Media consumers find it quite engaging to understand the unusual. The media were just doing their jobs when they hyped the story about Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan. I doubt if any public relations firm could have stimulated the media to spend time giving attention to figure skating as effectively as the Tonya Harding incident did. Because of the new growth of fan interest in the different subplots of a skating competition, the fan base grew. Many fans stuck around because they liked what they saw—not just little princess athletes, but vicious competitors with shady supporters and the full range of characters.

One reason television loves figure skating is that it draws a predominantly female audience. Some “football widows” who do not much care about America’s most popular sports truly love the grace and beauty (and violence and intrigue) of figure skating. Women do watch other sports, but they love figure skating enough that it can boost the ratings of multi-sport events like the Olympics and give advertisers a place to target. US Figure Skating works well with its sponsors, and they represent many product categories where women exercise important product-purchase influence and decisions: beauty products and fashion (Olay, NuSkin, Crest Whitestrips, Marshalls), wholesome food (Campbell’s, Smucker’s, Smart Ones), and all-American products (Chevy, State Farm).

A judge ruling in the Microsoft case compared Microsoft to Tonya Harding. That illustrates how widespread the consciousness of figure skating spread because of this incident. That case was the first time I heard a business tactic of a software company personified to a specific figure skater. Clearly the Harding/Kerrigan incident moved figure skating beyond the sports page.

When someone asked Tonya Harding what she was thinking, she replied that she was just trying to be the Charles Barkley of figure skating. Charles Barkley, replying to a question about that quote, said, “My initial response was to sue her for defamation of character, but then I realized that I had no character.” Once again we see a world far removed from figure skating, in this case the NBA, discussing and giving attention to the world of figure skating. Barkley himself must also understand that even bad publicity can be beneficial.

Madison Avenue used to think that a famous celebrity also had to be likeable (high Q score) to be effective, but a more modern view recognizes that some kinds of bad behavior can help with fame while not hurting appeal to consumers or segments of consumers. Of course, this principle has limits. Hertz does not employ OJ Simpson these days, and Kobe Bryant has disappeared from Nutella containers. But Ron Artest still has his fans in Indianapolis after his Detroit “basket brawl” in 2004. Alan Iverson impresses a lot of kids in Philadelphia and elsewhere, even if some of their parents wish he would deny that he is a role model. Charles Barkley articulated that claim once while on his way to even greater fame and influence.

Tonya Harding has remained somewhat of a public figure and has ostensibly earned some money from her celebrity in boxing. Others have also rebounded from bad publicity. One of the most famous examples of gratuitous violence in sport came when a television camera isolated American football player Mean Joe Greene punching an opponent for no apparent reason long after a play had ended. Mean Joe went on to star in an ad for Coke, in which a young boy brought a smile to a pain-plagued Joe’s face by offering a Coke. Some people consider that ad one of the best football and even sports ads of all time.

John McEnroe had a reputation for verbally abusing line judges during his reign as the great tennis champion, yet his reputation for skill as a tennis player overpowered his abusing image and rendered him an effective endorser of Nike products. John McEnroe, the 2005 celebrity, actually has a great deal more charm in his public image, even if his talk show did not survive.

Michelle Kwan has become something like the Tiger Woods of Ladies Figure Skating. She finished second to Tonya Harding in the U.S. Championships in 1994, when Nancy Kerrigan was injured and could not compete, and has done almost everything anyone could ask of a human since then, except for winning the elusive Olympic gold. With 5 World Championships, she has been featured in ads for Figure Skating sponsors such as Chevy, both boosting herself and her sport. She may lack the personal charm of Michael Jordan, but so do most of the rest of us. I doubt whether any other champion or any other publicity campaign could have improved much on the standing of U.S. Figure Skating.

Michelle Kwan should send Tonya Harding a “thank you” card for raising the profile of figure skating. Harding deserves her notoriety, and Kwan deserves and has earned her success. But Kwan would have had less economic success off the ice if Tonya Harding/Nancy Kerrigan described something that only involved the athletic side of skating. That affair spread the word of figure skating far and wide.

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