Episode 12
· 40:13
[Shirin Mollah] (0:00 - 0:42)
Welcome to the Sports Economist, the podcast where we dive deep into sports economics. I'm your host, Shirin Mollah, and today we're diving into the world of sports partnerships, not just revenues, but as a key player in team culture, fan connection, and long term strategy. I'm joined by Tyler Potts, Senior Director of Partnership Sales for the LA Rams.
Tyler brings a unique perspective on partnerships. We'll talk about what makes a great partnership, how teams measure value beyond the scoreboard. Let's start with the basics, how partnerships help shape this team behind the scenes, not just what fans see on the field.
How do partnerships shape a team's identity both on and off the field?
[Tyler Potts] (0:42 - 3:02)
Yeah, well, thank you for having me. I think it's a great question. I think when we look at the world of partnerships, there's a lot of, you know, different ways that that term is used, right.
And so for me, and for our team, it's that when you're going to a game and you're drinking your favorite soda, Pepsi, by the way, the official soda of the Rams, or your beer, right, Anheuser-Busch, Bud Light, Corona, those are our beer partners. Or you're seeing that the Toyota truck is the official truck of the LA Rams, or Porsche, official luxuriotic car, whatever that may be. And you're experiencing the brand, you're experiencing game day, you see the, you know, Princess Cruises treasure hunt on the video board.
The partnerships that, you know, that we work on, the goal is to make them very immersive, to make them part of the fan experience, to have our fans want to be associated with our partners, right, so that, you know, you go back home and you want to, I'm going to go buy a new car, well, I got to go buy the truck of my favorite team, I got to go buy Toyota, I want to drink a beer, I'm going to go grab a Bud Light, or I'm going to go grab a Corona, because that's the those are the beers of the Rams, right, when I'm hosting a watch party. And so we want our fans and we want the the brands to resonate with our fans.
And so really, when we look at partnerships, we look at it under under three lenses. One in the sense of yes, there's a there's a financial component, right, like we're talking to the brands, they make a financial commitment of financial investment in in the Rams, and being associated with the Rams, so that they can reach our fans reach our audience and can get their products and brands in front of our fans. There's also like we want to do partnerships that are endemic to our franchise to our fan base, right.
So, you know, in a prior prior role, I worked at the Dallas Cowboys, we had a we had a boot partner, Luke Casey boots was our official partner. We're not gonna have a boot partner in Los Angeles, right? Like that doesn't make sense, not endemic to our market, it wouldn't resonate with our fans.
So we want to make sure we're doing partnerships that resonate with our fans, so that it's not so that it drives that fan engagement. You know, and then the third piece, right? Like, do we do a partnership that is that makes sense from an organization standpoint?
Does it does the brand align with the innovation or the values or the types of brands that we want to be associated with from a Rams perspective? And really, like under those three pieces is where we look for like the sweet spot of like all of our partnerships, they're not always weighted equal, they don't always we don't always get all three. But our goal is to create partnerships that really have all three of those buckets.
[Shirin Mollah] (3:03 - 3:09)
So you talked about what you choose, but what what goes on behind the scenes?
[Tyler Potts] (3:09 - 3:09)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (3:09 - 3:12)
And is there more beyond just an investment?
[Tyler Potts] (3:13 - 4:34)
Yeah, I think like for for all of these, it's it's relationships, right? So like, yes, there's a for our partners, there's a financial investment that they make in the organization that they make in the marketing platforms, right, they're essentially buying access, right, they're buying access to our fan base, they're buying access to our IP, they're buying access to the events and programs and things that we host and, and have, and their brands can then be associated with them, they can use our IP like that, that is part of it 100%. But you know, it's deeper than that.
It's, it's, it's the relationships, you know, and I think one of the favorite, one of our favorite things to do is when we can bring partners together, you know, and create collaborations where we can have, you know, PacSun meet the Princess Cruises team meet the Anheuser-Busch team, and they can then work on, you know, potentially business relationships together as well. And so where we can see collaborative effort amongst our partners, too. So they're buying into, they're investing in the marketing pieces as well, but they're investing in the relationship and the association with our organization and, and the association with our, you know, with our leadership and the ownership that we have of the of the team, like that association is really, really the kind of driving factors in order to build that relationship so that, you know, it's authenticating things they're doing in the community, it's authenticating things that they're doing with their own campaigns, but it's also creating opportunities for them from a B2B perspective as well.
[Shirin Mollah] (4:35 - 4:46)
So you're kind of looking at it in long term, and what, you know, we want to see how the partnership can do in the long run, where are they going to be in the future with you as a partner?
[Tyler Potts] (4:46 - 6:47)
Yeah, I think there's there's definitely like a long view on some of these things, right? Like, we may we may in looking at a partnership, you know, again, our goal is to make all of our partnerships long term, like most of our say, on average, most of our partnerships are, you know, three to five years, right. And, you know, across pro sports teams, you know, we our goal is to always do long term investments or to do long term partnerships.
So that one that gives the brand time to build that equity to grow to create programs with us. But also, it allows us to kind of build that relationship together. And I think, you know, if you look at some of our partnerships that we have since coming back here to Los Angeles, you know, I've mentioned them a few times now, but like, like a Corona, like a, you know, like a Toyota, like a Hyundai had been with us throughout the entire time, like, we're now going into our 10th season with our relationship with Hyundai, like, the partnership looks very different today than it does 10 years, 10 years ago.
But we've grown it, we've worked together with them, we've created new platforms created new ownership pieces for them. So it's definitely like, a long term investment from a relationship perspective. And you know, and when you look at partnerships, you know, on a more human level, the the people that are the decision makers, you know, the CMOs of these brands, they're, they, they then move around.
And so the goal of us, our team, when we're going through kind of the partnership negotiations, or the back and forth on like, hey, where do we need to be? I think the goal is to try and find a relationship that is really a truly win win. If we get to a point where, hey, we've, we've, we've done a great deal for the Rams, we took all their money.
And but we aren't really going to deliver them that much. And at the end of that year, they're gonna say, hey, I didn't get anything. And that's gonna sour that relationship.
And ultimately, it's harder to find a replacement for a partner than continue a relationship with a partner. So our goal is to create mutually beneficial relationships that at the end of the partnership, a partner says, Wow, man, I really like, I really invested in the Rams, I got a great return on that investment. And now I want to invest more, right?
I spent x now I want to spend x more, because I know my return will only get greater.
[Shirin Mollah] (6:47 - 6:57)
It looks like it's like a two way street to a kind of, yeah, where it's like very much. So recently, I saw the draft video.
[Tyler Potts] (6:57 - 6:57)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (6:57 - 7:01)
And it was with it was with the fire department.
[Tyler Potts] (7:01 - 7:01)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (7:01 - 7:11)
And, you know, response to the LA fires. But what kind of partnership has kind of stepped up and really made a difference in culturally or?
[Tyler Potts] (7:12 - 7:12)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (7:12 - 7:13)
And just a social impact.
[Tyler Potts] (7:14 - 11:08)
Yeah, you meant you mentioned that one. So you know, historically, we've done these draft houses, right. And so for the last three years, really born out of COVID, we did the draft during COVID.
Les Snead, our general manager during COVID, he drafted from his from his house and said, Okay, that was that was easy. That wasn't a big deal. And so coming out of that we worked with first rocket mortgage.
And to do these houses were into the house in Malibu rented a house in the Hollywood Hills, we branded it and we did our draft from this house, right? Most NFL teams are doing their draft from a conference room, you see their players, you see their coaches and scouts, they're in suits and ties there. It's very serious.
That doesn't fit our culture like that doesn't fit the LA Rams, like we're Los Angeles, we have a little more fun, we're a little bit looser, we have like a more of a lifestyle brand. And so like we have coaches jumping in the pool after we draft a, you know, draft their player, right. And so the the draft house kind of was the embodiment of that, right.
And when we saw that come to life in in two instances, rocket mortgage, then we did it with SoFi, we've done it, we did it with Zillow. Coming into this draft season, obviously the devastating fires that happened in Los Angeles in January, we were very much affected by it, you know, players, families affected by it, staff members affected by it, and we had, you know, a game moved, we had to go to play a game in Arizona, play a playoff game in neutral territory in Arizona against Minnesota Vikings. It's a great win for us.
But it was a very, you know, very trying time for everyone in the city of Los Angeles and our organization and obviously, the fire department and we thought, hey, it doesn't probably really make sense to rent a house and show off an opulent mansion in Los Angeles at this time. So what can we do to honor the first responders? And so we went to our partner Zillow and said, hey, we kind of need you to trust us here.
Like, it's not going to be the big splashy draft house that's like name in lights that you've seen in the past. It's really going to be focused on first responders, we're going to draft live from the LAFDs aerial headquarters in Van Nuys from a hangar. And we really wanted to be all about giving back to the to the first responders.
And coming out of that, you know, we've actually seen as much if not more impressions and value driven back to Zillow, the partner, because it's something that felt endemic, it felt natural, it felt cause driven, versus something that oh, this is just a brand slapping their logo on something to get their name out there. Now, this is a brand in the Rams in Zillow, wanting to do good wanting to amplify the first responders. And it ended up performing really well for us.
Obviously, it was great. We hosted, you know, almost 300 first responders on Friday of draft. You know, Coach McVay gave them a speech that I think they all wanted to run through a wall after it was, it was really awesome.
And you got coverage on on the NFL draft coverage on our media partners, which is which is really incredible. And I think what we found is that's the secret sauce when you can find something that is has a community lane, it has a purpose, it tells a brain story in an authentic way, and it ties authentically to the market. That's really where you're going to find that like the real gold in partnerships.
The one other one just just on more of the community impact piece. So our we have a partnership with PacSun as well. And part of our partnership is a million dollar clothing donation that they make to us.
And so we take take those clothes and we use them to give out to schools in need or underserved communities here in Los Angeles. So one of the one of the number one reason or one of the top reasons why kids don't come to school is because they don't have clean clothes, they don't want to wear the same clothes over and over again. And so through this partnership with PacSun, we've been able to kind of create like free shopping days at these schools, kids can go pick up clothes.
We've also created a program called Loads of Love, where we brought washer and dryers into schools. So parents can actually come to school and do the laundry. So the kids have kids have clean clothes, thanks to PacSun, thanks to P&G and Tide, and thanks to kind of the Rams partnership there.
So that's one that like, you know, it isn't, it isn't a big massive name and lights partnership, but it's definitely made an impact here in the LA community.
[Shirin Mollah] (11:09 - 11:30)
So you led us the transition of how partnerships build connection, fans having this loyalty or belonging, but not only did you have talked about the fans, you also talked about a community. I wanted to know what makes a partnership feel real. And it's just beyond the logo.
[Tyler Potts] (11:30 - 13:10)
Yeah, yeah, I think I think that that is the biggest piece is making sure it is beyond the logo. And, and it's that authenticity, right? So like, you know, we look I look at our partnership with Zillow over the last two years, and you know, the rally cry for the Rams, if you will, is whose house Rams house, right?
So Rams house, SoFi Stadium is our home, that home thematic ties in well with a brand like Zillow, who's helping families find their find their home, whether it's find your dream home, whether it's find your next home, whether it's find your first home, Zillow is a great partner to do that. And so there's an authentic connection it, you can see naturally that, okay, I see why Zillow would be a part of that, or I see why that makes sense, because of the, because of those natural synergies. I think those are the ones that, you know, round peg round hole that that really make the make the difference.
You know, I think about like the really the goal of any of these partnerships is to create that long term fandom, right? So, you know, you look at, you know, great partnership, like, you know, the Dallas Cowboys have is they've, they have had a decade long relationship with with Molson Coors, Miller Lite, it's the official beer of the Dallas Cowboys, it's the only beer of the Dallas Cowboys, and they're very proud to say that the idea that a Cowboys fan when they're hosting a party, they're going to buy the beer with the Rams with the Cowboys logo on it, we want to bring that same, you know, brand love and fervor to our partners at, you know, Corona or Bud Light or our partners at Toyota or our partners at at Hyundai, right? Like, that's, that's really our goal. How do we create a relationship where when our fan sees 1800 tequila, they know, oh, that's the Rams official tequila, I'm going to go buy that because I'm a Rams fan, I want to support my team support my team's partners.
[Shirin Mollah] (13:11 - 13:26)
In economics, they have this willingness to pay. And I feel like when you have this team, and if you're an LA Rams team fan, you're going to have a higher willingness to pay for even just like one of the partnerships.
[Tyler Potts] (13:27 - 13:27)
Absolutely.
[Shirin Mollah] (13:27 - 13:45)
Brands. Yeah. And I like how you guys did the Rams house and have Zillow because then you could, all of the other partnerships is kind of like the things that are going to be found in your house.
Even if it's a Toyota, you're going to have a Toyota that's part of your house. And it's like just building that connection with the fans.
[Tyler Potts] (13:45 - 14:38)
100% Yeah, and we did that we you know, we had we had Toyotas in the garage, we had Porsches out on the sidewalk, we had Anheuser Busch product, and we had called consolation products in the fridge, we had Frito Lay chips and Pepsi's everywhere we had sleep number who's our official bed partner, we had the bedrooms are all decked out with sleep number beds on draft houses in the past. So we got to bring really that like home thematic to life, which was which was really exciting. And I think and you know that that willingness to pay is what we in a lot of our conversations with partners is we show them like, hey, that when you attach your name to our name, or when you touch our name to your name, you know, similar to the logo on your undershirt here, right?
The, the brand perception can increase and someone's willingness to pay extra for a product that has the Rams logo on it or any NFL team logo on it, right? We've seen that with with the data on it.
[Shirin Mollah] (14:39 - 14:43)
So what tells you that a partnership has clicked with the audience?
[Tyler Potts] (14:44 - 15:22)
I think I think that is that it is that that endemic piece you talk about, like when I see fans posting their photos on social and digital of their party at home, and they have those consumer products that are part partners, or when you see a Toyota truck riding around and it's got a Rams logo on the back, right? Like those are those things help us, you know, click. I also think when the brand continues to come back and reinvest in us, the you know, the economics of that, right?
Like they they continue to double down and spend more and reinvest in the partnership and reinvest in the relationship that that is really what helps us, you know, sure shows us that it's working, right? The proof's in the pudding there.
[Shirin Mollah] (15:23 - 15:29)
So now we'll look at teams and brands working together in creative ways and what it takes to try something new.
[Tyler Potts] (15:30 - 15:30)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (15:30 - 15:33)
What does it take to try something new in a partnership?
[Tyler Potts] (15:33 - 17:14)
Yeah, I think on the team side, it's, it takes like leadership that's not afraid to fail. And we're super lucky at the Rams, you know, our leadership across the board, you know, with starts with Mr. Kroenke, our owner, but but Kevin Demoff, our team president, Jen Prince, our chief commercial officer, like, you know, and our brand team and, you know, Cat Frederick on the marketing side, and Molly Higgins on the community side, like all of them were, let's try it, right? Like, we won't know if it works, if it doesn't, if it doesn't work, like, again, like trying something like the draft house, or trying something like, you know, moving our training camp to a to a partner location, like we did moving into LMU.
Or even some things you'll see coming up this summer that we're going to do that we'll announce here in the next couple weeks of some special stuff that we're doing that no other team has done before. And I think those are the things that that really allow us to be innovative is like, being okay, being like, well, that didn't work, let's try something else different. And so if we and we hit, we've hit on a few of them, which, which helps.
But the biggest piece of that is then also having our partners that are willing to lean in on that and say, Hey, we trust like Zillow on this, this piece this year with the LA fire department, like they said, Hey, what worked for you in the is you guys have worked great with us in the past. How do we continue doing that? Well, hey, we have an idea, we need you to trust us, like that trust and that relationship, you have to have that because we sleep and breathe the Rams brand every day, they sleep and breathe their brand every day, how we can use that expertise to come together.
Like we may be like, Hey, I actually think we need to take a risk here and try something new and different. And if you don't haven't built that trust and relationship with a partner, if you haven't shown them that, hey, when we take risks, it pays off. You're not gonna be able to do those things.
[Shirin Mollah] (17:14 - 17:18)
We established the partnership last year.
[Tyler Potts] (17:18 - 17:22)
Yeah, just finished our second season together as partners. Yeah, without Yeah, yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (17:22 - 17:35)
So you you're really active and being a part of the Marymount University community. But that's a that's a different kind of partnership. So it's more of a work academically.
How has that been?
[Tyler Potts] (17:35 - 19:10)
Yeah, yeah. So there's there's really like three components of our partnership with between, you know, the Rams and LMU that there is, you know, some marketing pieces of us using the platform of the Rams and the things that we have at SoFi Stadium and the visibility of our brand to promote LMU with, you know, TV visible signage and opportunities to showcase the brand on an NFL stage, right, to show that, hey, LMU is a preeminent university that that belongs on that stage with, with kind of the global brands that we that we work with.
You know, there's also a component with some opportunities to help engage with alumni, right? So, you know, tickets, hospitality, things that allow alumni to come back and touch and feel the relationship. But But to your point, my favorite part of the relationship is is really the the students that we get to touch.
And so, you know, it's the class projects, we get to work on that you've had a couple classes get to be a part of the immersion projects. It's the the guest speakers that are executives have come spoken classes, it's the it's the internships, you know, we did a we did a mentorship program this year, we had, I think, almost 40, maybe more students from LMU got to come shadow a Rams employee for a game day, got to really have a great experience doing that, which was which was great. That was an incredible experience, both for the students, both for the staff, to get to see for them to get to see what what goes on behind the scenes on an NFL game day.
And then we've we have internships where we have we have three or four now full time staff that have started in the LMU internship program that have now been hired on full time at the Rams that are now Rams employees. And we hope that continues to grow as we as we continue our partnership.
[Shirin Mollah] (19:10 - 20:08)
Yeah, so I want to touch on the experience that I've had with your whole team. And so far, so we were able to take our whole entire class to the SoFi stadium. You know, we got a tour, but not only a tour, we had someone speak about how the stadium was built, what it was, what it took.
You know, the students also got to present in the locker room, which is a very nice experience. And then we also got to go to the headquarters, LA Rams headquarters. And we had a lot of panelists, and he were one of them.
But we got to talk to everyone from different departments and get insights. And there was there were several students there, there was a whole class 30 students, they got to learn more about what each department was doing at the LA Rams. So I found that very helpful, even if they were like interested in an internship or a job in sports, you guys provided that guidance.
And I think it I think it's a great partnership.
[Tyler Potts] (20:08 - 21:32)
Yeah, yeah, it was really great. And I think it outlined hopefully for the students or that the the parallels with sports with economics with with what we're what we do in the business world. At the end of the day, a professional sports team is that it is a business, right?
It, it may look a little different and they run a little different, but like we operate very similarly, you know, we have around 300 employees, we have, we have a finance department, we have a legal department, we have strategy departments, we have sales, we have community relations, like we have HR, like, we run just like a normal, normal business. And, you know, just like the normal, normal business looks at trends, or, hey, how do we price our tickets correctly? What is the economic model look like, for pricing, concession stands, pricing tickets, like all those things, we're, we're doing those things, we have to do those things.
We do the same thing on the partnership side, or, or even as we look at, okay, hey, as we build the, you know, we just announced we're building a new headquarters in Woodland Hills. As we look at that, the and we go try and find partners for that and a naming rights partner for that all of those things, the revenue and the dollars that we have in our partnerships, we will use that to build that build those venues, right? And we take those contracts, we use them, we go to the bank, that's how we work on our financing, all those different things.
And so there are a lot of like, kind of general business principles that I think people don't realize a pro sports team has to way more than just a we play some football games, it's a it's a full 365 business built on the back of, you know, what's going on on the field.
[Shirin Mollah] (21:33 - 21:50)
That leads me to trade offs. And economics, you know, there's, I mean, we do this every single day, we have a trade off in our time. But there's a lot of brands that want to work with us partners.
How do you guys choose that? And what's like the trade off and your time, your energy money?
[Tyler Potts] (21:50 - 23:03)
Yeah, so it's a great question. I think like we, I wish it was as easy as saying, well, we just get to all of the everybody comes to us, and we just pick the ones we want to work with. We our team spends a ton of time out cultivating prospecting and trying to go find those brands that want to work with us.
I think we do have a trade off of like, you know, not everyone can, not everyone can afford a part NFL team partnership, or not all brands are ready to work to work with us. And so, you know, there may be some brands to say, Hey, I only have X amount of marketing dollars to spend with you guys. We miss it.
Hey, like, that doesn't make sense for us right now. Because of the amount of effort or work or like, because of the amount of revenue, like we just maybe might decide to go a different direction. But ultimately, like that's sometimes saying no to deals or looking at a partnership and saying, Hey, this is a really great partnership might be the great brand fit, but some of the things that we'd have to do, or some of the pieces we'd have to give to do this, the value isn't there for us.
And so we may decide that that doesn't make sense. You know, and we deal with that, like we have some thresholds we implement around how we operate our business of like, hey, we have to have partners at a certain level and all those different things, so that we don't get in a situation where we're kind of the trade offs end up in the in the negative for us.
[Shirin Mollah] (23:04 - 23:08)
So when's a partnership that you took a leap of faith, and it paid off?
[Tyler Potts] (23:08 - 24:21)
Yeah. Well, you know, I think going back to our, you know, I know, we've talked about draft house a little bit here already. But, you know, it's fresh given given it was just last week, but our original the original partnership that we did with rocket mortgage going back, you know, four years ago, no one had ever done it before, no one had ever sponsored their draft at a house, no one had ever done their draft anywhere other than their facility outside of COVID.
And some teams did it, you know, some teams did it on a yacht, some teams did it in their home, some teams did it at their facility. But we were able to go to them and say, they said, Hey, can you bring us an idea that's what they like to call first best and only and so something that no one else has done before, someone that's like best of class and someone that only something only we could pull off at the time. And, you know, we were able to take them this idea of renting a house and blowing it out and making it Rams branded at rocket mortgage branding.
And I think they, they lent in with us and said, Okay, let's great. Let's go. Let's go do it.
Coming out of that, you know, it was, it was it was front page news. It was on SportsCenter, it was on ESPN, it got tweets going back and forth between teams talking about like, well, who has better houses and all those different things like created buzz. And that's really something that just, you know, absolutely has paid has paid off for us in spades.
[Shirin Mollah] (24:22 - 24:44)
We talked a little bit about these partnerships, beyond just the fans or the teams. But you talked about community, and you talked about the la fires. And you also talked about your PacSun partnership.
But what other partnerships do you have that are towards a cause or an impact in the community?
[Tyler Potts] (24:44 - 27:15)
Yeah, I mean, I mean, a lot of them, right, a lot of our partnerships have community elements to them. Our community team, Molly Higgins, our team do an incredible job in the LA community. And so a lot of our deals have those components, you know, I think about what Cedar Sinai does with us around the crucial catch game and early detection for cancer awareness and the hospital visits we do with our players part of that partnership.
You know, our partnerships with LA care, around mental health and wellness, all those different things that we do going out in the community, our partnership with Edward life sciences, where we're doing heart screenings and underserved communities. So heart disease is a big issue and kind of more underserved communities, black and brown communities, they're not going to the doctor, they're not getting screened for for heart failure or heart disease. And so we've taken some former players, some legends, some Rams players, we've gone into these communities and said, Hey, we're the Rams player is going to get screened today, you can get screened alongside a legend or alongside a Rams player.
Thanks to the support of Edward life sciences. And we've gone in and we've there have been individuals that we've then said, Hey, you need a hospital like we need to you need to get this checked out further, and had life saving procedures because of because of that, those types of partnerships in the community. You know, I think about some of the things we do with Little Caesars and their love kitchen, which is a big 18 wheeler semi truck that they bring into, you know, really underserved and at need communities.
And they, they say it's basically a Little Caesars truck on wheels, and it rolls in and can serve, you know, 500 people an hour on or a couple 100 people an hour and serving food to those in the in need and underserved communities. We've done some great events with them as well. There's, you know, I can sit here for a couple hours and probably give you all the examples of the community partnerships.
It's such a big piece of what what we do. It's such a big piece of what the Rams do as a brand, but then it becomes even a bigger piece of a lot of our partnerships. And I think that's the great piece about one of the things I love about partnerships is we get to touch almost every department or all the different teams within the organization.
You know, yes, we work with our football team, and we work with things around football operations, you know, and players, but then we also work with game presentation, we work with our tickets team, we work with fan engagement, we work with community, you know, we work with our strategy team, like we work with our media and social digital, our studios team, like it's what I love about partnerships is we get to sit kind of in the middle and work with every single department. I don't know that there are many other departments in sports, you know, outside of maybe like finance and HR, they get to touch every single department within the organization.
[Shirin Mollah] (27:16 - 27:18)
What's your partnerships with youth participation?
[Tyler Potts] (27:18 - 28:53)
Yeah, I think we have it. We have a few of them. And I think for us, you know, the growth of our fan base will come from the kids that are in between seven and 12 today, right?
Like that kind of age group. They're, they're the future of Rams fandom here in Los Angeles. And so we have our Rams Football Academy, which is very much focused on youth participation.
We do hundreds of camps and different clinics throughout Los Angeles. We do play 60 events at tons of different schools throughout LA. But I think one thing we're specifically proud of is our kind of helping pioneer girls flag.
So California was one of the first states, if not the first to sanction girls flag as a high school sport. The Rams played a big, big piece in that. And then we've brought on partners like Nike, Gatorade and Bridgestone to help support.
So originally in our first girls flag jamboree, I think we expected to have about 500 girl participants. We had over 900. We've since grown that to over over 1200 participants in the last girls flag jamboree.
We expected to have about 40 teams reach out to us for help and support. We ended up with almost 90 teams reach out for help and support. And so thanks to our partners at Nike, Gatorade and Bridgestone, we've been able to give girls flags, girls flag kits to all the schools.
And we have seen tons of excitement around girls flags, specifically youth sports, really focused on youth football, boys and girls flag seven on. But I think we're really excited about the future of our fandom relative to girls flag. And then that obviously leads right into, you know, flag football becoming an Olympic sport in 2028, which will be hosted right here in LA.
[Shirin Mollah] (28:54 - 29:00)
So do you think that there has been growth since the announcement of flag football in the Olympics?
[Tyler Potts] (29:00 - 29:46)
Yeah, I think I think absolutely. I think I think there's absolutely growth has been growth in flag football. But I but I also think just like in general, I think getting girls involved in in football and from the from a youth perspective, like is really exciting.
I think, you know, the number of times I've been able to host a guest at a game or a partner at a game and they brought their daughter and their daughter is is talking about the X's and O's. And they're like, yeah, this is the same play I run in my flag football game or, you know, we're playing in the in the flag football bowl at SoFi Stadium later this weekend. Like, that's really cool.
It's just it's just cool to see the game growing and growing with with a new a new new fandom. And they've always been there. But now having the having the ability to actually go out and play and express it is really cool and really fun to see.
[Shirin Mollah] (29:46 - 30:02)
So starting a sport in high school is not easy. And you just mentioned that you've, you know, given them starter kits. How do you think that really helps the like the school like start off?
[Tyler Potts] (30:02 - 31:05)
Yeah, I think like, so, you know, on our community team, and I mentioned Molly and then, you know, Jonathan Franklin, who really is pioneering our girls flag efforts. And Noel Grigsby, as well on our on our team, like they're there. Yes, they're extensions of our, our brand to help drive the fandom.
But really, it's we want we want more participation across the board in football, right? Whether that's flag, whether that's tackle, you know, the Watts Rams we do with the with the LAPD is another great youth sports program. But I think for us, right, we want to the participation in sports, you can look at lots of studies that say, hey, participating in sports being a part of a team like that's, that's really great for young, young adults, and as they grow up as children, and that sense of community creates.
And so if we can help be a part of creating that, to then hopefully lead to like, well, I had a Rams jersey as I was a kid, or, oh, I played flag football inside SoFi Stadium. That's really, really a big piece of what we what we look at. And on top of all of the incredible reasons why it's valuable, just just another one.
[Shirin Mollah] (31:05 - 31:11)
You talked about the Olympics. What are the world events that are happening in Los Angeles? The World Cup?
[Tyler Potts] (31:12 - 32:30)
Yeah, yeah, you mentioned some of them. So we're super excited that, you know, SoFi Stadium will get to play host to, you know, the really three of the largest global events there are in the 2026 World Cup, the 2027 Super Bowl and the 2028 Olympics will be the first stadium ever to host all three of those events. And we're going to do it back to back back years.
In addition, you know, into a dome across the street from us will be hosting NBA All-Star Game. We have, you know, a half marathon coming to SoFi Stadium here with our partners at Nike. So really, as you look at the next five years, there is not a major global sports event that doesn't come to Los Angeles.
And so we're really excited about that. You know, while while the Olympics and FIFA and Super Bowl are not our events, the they're owned by FIFA and NFL and the U.S. of the Olympic Committee, like respectively, it's valuable to us because it gets the name of our venue out. It just increases the visibility of our of our partners and saying that they're getting to be associated with the venue that hosts all these events, you know, and plus the incredible economic impact it has for us in the stadium, for our retail district, for the hotel we're building, for the city of Inglewood and all around Los Angeles.
You know, getting to host these three major global events and back to back years is is really going to be an incredible feat. And we're super fortunate and lucky to have that in our venue.
[Shirin Mollah] (32:30 - 32:49)
Yeah, there's a lot of studies on economic impact of stadiums, but mega events as well. And I find that unique because we have one in 2026, the World Cup. Then we have the Olympics and a Super Bowl in between there and then the Super Bowl in between it.
So that is going to be a very unique study.
[Tyler Potts] (32:50 - 32:56)
Yeah, they're definitely going to be a lot of I'm sure you probably have an entire class on the economic impact of those three years.
[Shirin Mollah] (32:56 - 33:07)
Yeah, exactly. So you have a lot of experience in And, you know, you worked with the different teams as well. But how have you seen the changes in partnerships over time?
[Tyler Potts] (33:07 - 34:48)
Yeah, yeah. So I I'm going into now my 13th NFL season, my six with the Rams was spent two years in the middle with legends working on the Raiders stadium project in Las Vegas, and then was at the Dallas Cowboys for five before that. You know, when you look at what partnerships look like 13 years ago, they didn't they weren't as content driven, right?
There were partners that didn't have social media in their partnerships. It was on my name and lights. I want a bright, shiny sign.
I want traditional media. And they and they they weren't made, I think. So the two biggest pieces is really like the addition of digital and social and really that connection to who we want to be on multiple devices reaching fans.
And then the team's investments teams are invest investing in content. And so being able to have a partner help invest in those that content with us as well. That's a really big shift.
I think they've seen of like, if you look over the last decade, there are very few partnerships that we do now that don't have some sort of social digital or content component to it. The other thing is, I think, again, it was the big shiny bright lights, which are hard to measure from an ROI standpoint. And so now I think the data and analytics around partnerships has really grown and is starting to catch up to kind of other traditional marketing assets.
You know, before it was, well, it's a passion buy, it's fandom, we want to get our name in lights, we want to see the bright, shiny objects. And now it's well, hey, show me show me how there's ROI for this, show me how many widgets I'm going to sell or show me the reach or show me my brand lift. Or what demand am I can I can I expect from, you know, entering this partnership?
Those are all things that you know, questions we get now and things we have to work through with partners now that we weren't getting, you know, a decade ago.
[Shirin Mollah] (34:49 - 35:03)
I've also noticed the engagement of trying to get fans to be like, I've noticed the fan engagement and how the partnerships have changed over time. So for example, the infinity screen.
[Tyler Potts] (35:04 - 35:04)
Yeah.
[Shirin Mollah] (35:05 - 35:12)
I find that more interesting when you see something there's a way of there's like a halftime. Yeah, the way that they engage.
[Tyler Potts] (35:13 - 35:26)
Yeah, I mean, I were super fortunate to have these incredible, incredible venue of SoFi and to use that infinity screen and the five levels of LED to really bring our partnerships to life and make it an immersive game day experience.
[Shirin Mollah] (35:26 - 35:36)
Yeah. So what is teamwork mean to you? It could be on the field, you know, if you play sports, but also outside the field.
[Tyler Potts] (35:37 - 37:06)
Yeah, I think, you know, a lot of the you know, a lot of people we work with are sports fans, former athletes. And so I think there is a there's a sense of team in any sports organization you work with of like that collaboration. I think we, as I mentioned earlier, like we had partnerships sit in the middle of a lot of different departments.
And so we have to go ask a lot of departments for help. Right. We have to go ask our studios team, hey, we need your help on this.
We have to go ask our community team. We need your help on this. We have to go ask our tickets and hospitality team.
Hey, we need your help on this. And you can't do that if all if all the time all we're doing is asking, we have to create those partnerships that are mutually beneficial. We have to be we have to work good at work well as a team, because what our partnerships partnership department's objectives are may not always align with another department's objective.
And so I think like one is figuring out what are the organization's objectives? You know, for us, it's number one, win football games. Number two, it's grow fandom.
And, you know, number three, it's trying to figure out how we grow the business as part of that as well. And so everything we do needs to hit one of one or multiple of those objectives. And so we're all chasing towards the same goal, like win a Super Bowl every year, drive an effective business and grow our fan base.
Then it's how do we collaborate together to I need you to I need this help with this or I need you guys to lean in here. Here's how I'm going to help you hit your goal as part of that. And I think the collaboration and teamwork we have to have on the partnership side is paramount, because if we didn't have those other departments, we wouldn't be able to deliver for our partners.
[Shirin Mollah] (37:07 - 37:32)
What I've noticed is from your whole organization is I've I've talked to each person in a different department. I almost see that reflection on the fields, right? Every single person has their position, but they're all working as a team and working for the L.A. Rams organization. I wonder how you guys like think about it in a different way. You think about it on the on the field and then off the field.
[Tyler Potts] (37:32 - 37:43)
So, yeah, I think there's definitely the sports, the sports connection there of like, you know, the next man up mentality and teamwork. And we collectively all have to do our jobs really well in order for us to be successful.
[Shirin Mollah] (37:43 - 37:48)
So what's your advice about entering the partnership direction?
[Tyler Potts] (37:48 - 39:34)
Yeah. Yeah. I think, you know, for for young professionals looking to be get into the world of sports and partnerships, I think what I what I found in talking to and interviewing and being a part of interviews and interviewing myself for a number of jobs over the years is everybody's I'm a sports fan.
I like the team. I'm a fan of this team. Like we look for someone who loves the business of sports.
Right. So you may not actually be a fan of that team, but you love the business of sport and you want to help that team with their business side. So I think it's one it's making sure that you are looking at the role for the right reasons of like, hey, I don't want this job because I like going to sports games and I want to be I want to be around players and I want to be a fan.
It's I actually love the work. I love the business of sport. And so we look for we look for folks that are saying that that's what they love.
Right. And for me, that's what I love. The business of partnerships.
I love getting able to take a brand and to connect it with the Rams brand and help grow that brand and solve their business challenges. I think, you know, what I what I see in in the young professionals that are successful in this industry or in in in getting into the partnerships, it's internships. Right.
It's networking. You know, no. Everybody loves helping students.
How can you when you're a student take advantage of those opportunities? You know, if you're an LMU student, take advantage of the opportunities we have at the Rams. But I think really it's it's networking and it's internships.
And it's once you have those internships going above and beyond. Right. Like it's it's very rare that the interns that we see get hired on are the ones that are like, well, they had this great one great idea and like made us all this money.
Like, no, it's the ones that show up every day, go the extra mile. And before they leave, say, hey, what else can I do to help or hey, what else can I work on? Is there any other projects you can that I can help with or be a part of?
Like those are the ones that go the extra mile. And really, I see be successful.
[Shirin Mollah] (39:35 - 39:39)
Thank you so much, Tyler Potts. I appreciate having you here.
[Tyler Potts] (39:39 - 39:40)
Of course.
[Shirin Mollah] (39:40 - 39:43)
And it's always a great partnership with working with L.A. Rams.
[Tyler Potts] (39:44 - 39:46)
Yeah. Awesome. Thank you for having me.
Thank you.
[Shirin Mollah] (39:46 - 40:02)
Until next time, teammates, I'm Shereen Mola and this is the Sports Economist. If you enjoyed today's discussion, be sure to subscribe and leave us a review. And don't forget to follow us on social media for more insights into the fascinating world of sports economics.
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