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Red Bulls managing director says it’s billboards or players - alludes that you can’t have both

You know those times when if you would just sit and think about something - level headed without the emotion that comes unfettered with the human condition – the answer would probably come to you? It’s those times as well, when sometimes you just need someone to say something and then the practical reality triggers whatever it is in our brains that makes you say, “of course!” Well, I thought I had one of those moments reading Michael Lewis’ piece with Red Bulls managing director Marc de Grandpre. But then I sat and thought about it…

de Grandpre asked (and then answered) the question:

“Would you rather see a 40-foot billboard of the Red Bulls in Times Square for a week or would you rather have JPA (Juan Pablo Angel) on the field for a couple of years? We would rather have JP on the field. We think that’s a no-brainer and that’s what we’re going to keep focusing on.”

Well, when you put it like that. For the record, I work in Times Square. Right in the middle of it. When you see the ball drop and Dick Clark almost keel over, my office building is likely in the frame. Oh, it’s a scene, man. You got Puffy with his fist up showing his solidarity (oh, and he has a track jacket on made by the company which helps pay allows him to make reality shows about how he urinates in the morning, but yeah he loves you), America’s Next Top never-going-to-get-work Model, Bubba Gump restaurant, the bastions of finger-on-the-pulse coolness MTV and The Hard Rock Café, etc, etc.

I always wonder whether those ads do any good, pump any numbers for the companies that buy them, or if it’s more of an ego thing, a “look at me in the bright lights big city.” I for one couldn’t care less about those billboards. To see them is to mock them. Really, Puffy and Times Square are made for each other. A quick survey of my office left people trying to even recall one billboard, most agreeing they tend to blur together after awhile into an electronic Jackson Pollack print.

So de Grandpre makes a good point, right? Eh, not so much. A billboard in Times Square is obviously not the only option, but sure it makes a cute little example. (breaking news: Red Bulls eliminate uniforms to save more money for aging foreigners) It doesn’t get the Red Bulls off the hook. The fact remains there are plenty of cheaper options for marketing that they could do that wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg, or to use his example, the two legs of JP.

We all saw the images of immigrant fans coming out to cheer their countrymen in various MLS cities, but we didn’t see that in New York. We don’t see Red Bull players out in the community. We haven’t seen anything like that. Last summer I saw trashcans in Time Square with Landon Donovan, something about ‘colors,’ (I told you I didn’t pay much attention to those signs, but now that I think about it, what’s Landon doing in an ad in New York. Sure he is the biggest star in MLS, but he ain’t a Red Bull, the local team, remember them? Those trashcan posters along with a billboard outside of Penn Station must have been MLS ads, because the Red Bulls were too busy focusing on building their team last year, of course. No, of course last year there wasn’t much to tout about the Red Bulls, but as de Grandpre stated, now there clearly is. They have built up a nice team. a nice team no one comes to see. What would the players say about that if they didn’t have to tow the company line?

So buy a couple of busses, or use those god-awful Red Bull Mobiles I’ve seen around the nation the last five years slanging your soda alternative and send them into the outer boroughs and get some fans to the game. You just announced the new fancy pants park is going to be at least 2 months late (I’d bet on 2009 at this point), and you constantly complain about your 80,000-seat stadium. So fill it.

It’s empty right now and you aren’t selling tickets. Give the damn things away, maybe just upper level seats, or open the gates at half time to whoever wants to come in, even if it encourages those who would pay to not buy tickets. I’m talking about a one-year push while we wait for the new stadium. A new magazine gives out free issues all the time. Red Bull goes to bars all across the country giving out their neon elixir. Why can’t a sports team do that?

Give people a ride to the game, so they don’t have to trek the nearly 2 hours on public transportation to get there (as I know at least one of Red Bulls’ youth stars had to from his home in Queens this past winter for practice). Maybe those people will buy a ticket to the next game (keep giving them rides!!!) or maybe, even better, you keep filling the stadium with fans, free or paid, for every home game and watch the passion of the team grab hold of a real home-field advantage. That kind of investment might actually be worth more than JP.

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As if we needed more ammo: Another great investment by RBNY!