Cubs, Fans and now adidas wants to see the curse broken!

The Chicago Cubs are looking to break their 108-Year drought/CURSE of winning the World Series, the longest such drought/CURSE in major sports. Everyone knows the story of the Cubs and the CURSES that have plagued them to this day, but this year feels different to fans of the Chicago North Siders. It also feels different to one particular brand that is just as passionate about the Cubs ending their curse as their fans!

Leading into Game 5 tonight, I wanted to take a look at adidas’s “#S@& CURSES” campaign and how their Guerrilla Marketing tactic has taken over the city of Chicago, as well as San Francisco and Los Angeles for the last couple weeks.

First, let’s start with why adidas initiated this campaign in the first place, with the first reason being pretty obvious… Kris Bryant. The leading MVP candidate has been with the “Three Stripes” brand since 2014 and is proving to be a great investment in only two seasons in the Major Leagues so far. The defending NL Rookie of the Year hit 39 HR, with 102 RBI and a .292 Batting Average, leading many analysts to anoint him as this year’s NL MVP.

adidas is also the apparel partner of the current Cubs closer, Arodis Chapman, who debuted a new glove this postseason that features a prominent adidas logo in the Cubs primary colors.

In addition, besides a player’s shoes or gloves, adidas doesn’t have as much of a presence in Major League Baseball as they do in other sports. Majestic is the makers of the team uniforms and official apparel (though that will change in 2020), Nike has a deal to produce the undershirts and athletic/”workout” apparel and New Era produces the official hats for the league. In MLB, adidas is a brand that relies on their individual player sponsorships and hope they become the great player they are expected to be!

Now that we have covered adidas’s background for this campaign, let’s take a look at what they have done so far –

First, it started off fairly small actually. Through their adidas Baseball Twitter and Facebook pages, they began posting “#S@& CURSES” images in the Cubs color scheme, encouraging users to update their profile pictures to the image before Game 1 of the NLDS vs. San Francisco.

After the Cubs’ Game 1 victory, the physical signs debuted as giveaways at two pubs in Wrigleyville. They continued to pop-up throughout the Lakeview/Wrigleyville area during NLDS week, as seen in the pictures I took below.

But the phrase also followed the team as it travelled across the country for Games 3 and 4, popping up in McCovey Cove thanks to two resident kayakers. Perhaps they were paid or just West Coast Cub fans looking to support the cause, but this gave viewers an idea that this campaign was not going to be just for those in Chicago. And this was just an appetizer to this campaign.

When the Cubs came back to Chicago last weekend to begin the NLCS, the campaign began to expand. The giveaways continued with T-Shirts joining the aforementioned signs at Murphy’s Bleachers bar behind Wrigley Field. The slogan began appearing on street signs throughout the city in the form of stickers. But the pies de résistance was one tactic that left me wondering if they actually did it???

The adidas team may have been able to carve the “#S@& CURSES” phrase into the Oak Street Beach, for everyone flying over the city to see. An impressive and memorable piece of experiential marketing prowess from adidas as a part of this campaign, if it was real of course! If not, it was still a great way to for adidas to illustrate how they want this campaign to reach the entire the city of Chicago.

Then came a couple quiet days from the company as the Cubs went to Los Angeles for Games 3, 4 and 5. Thursday morning, they awoke with a bang, after the Cubs had tied the series 2-2. adidas Baseball posted images of a plane carrying a “#S@& CURSES” banner flying over Santa Monica pier.

Stickers being posted across the California train stations, even across a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Under close glance, my guess would be Bill Murray’s because the first letter is definitely a “B” and notice how the next two letters looks like it could be “I” and “L” back-to-back.

They even had another Oak Beach moment of were they able to do this? An image was posted where it looked like the “#S@& CURSES” was mown into a bank of Los Angeles State Historic Park. Another moment that had me questioning if they would have gotten permission to do it!

However, the final piece of this campaign’s puzzle (at the time of this writing) was definitely done… And it made my jaw drop! After the Cubs won Game 5 to take a 3-2 series lead, adidas infiltrated the Los Angeles Airport and its iconic LAX sign. It hung actually hung a “#S@& CURSES” banner on said sign! A move reminiscent of some of the great rivalries in sports and their treatment of each other’s landmarks, this banner provided an official OMG moment that a Marketing Campaign needs to become memorable!

But it showed consumers and fans how invested adidas is in the Cubs Playoff Run and how they wanted to illustrate that this was going to be a nation-wide campaign. The Cubs are a team and brand with a nationwide fan base. Just look at how many fans attended the away games in Los Angeles and San Francisco this postseason, including my sister at Game 4 of the NLDS!

Chicago isn’t the only city who wants to see this curse broken… The entire country wants this to happen! adidas has done an amazing job with embracing that fact, spreading this campaign across the country, with the idea that if the team doesn’t care about the curse, why should the fans?

I have enjoyed following this campaign this Postseason and I cannot wait to see what they have in store if the Cubs win Game 6 or 7 this weekend.

Knock on Wood…

 

Continue following this campaign through the following accounts –

adidas Baseball – Facebook; @adidasbaseball

Jeremy Darlow – Head of adidas Digital @JeremyDarlow

Michael Ehrlich – adidas PR Director @MichaelEhrlich

Battle of the Brands – Week 5 of the College Football Season

As a new feature for my blog/podcast, I’ve decided to start a series that focuses on the College Football field and the battle taking place between Nike, adidas and Under Armour to capture “national” viewers’ attention.

I’ve mentioned this battle many times through previous posts and podcasts, so here are my thoughts on how the battle is brewing so far this season.

This will begin a weekly series, where my rankings may change, I analyze the biggest wins of the week for each brand, and I take at look at the upcoming week’s match-ups that you should pay attention too!

 

My current rankings –

1. Nike – # of Partners in the AP Top 25 – 19
2. adidas – # of Partners in the AP Top 25 – 4
3. Under Armour – # of Partners in the AP Top 25 – 2

Nike

While they are clearly dominating in the sheer number of FBS Partners they have compared to Under Armour and adidas, especially in the Top 25, their streak of being the only apparel provide in the Playoff could end this season. But for now, they are your leaders for these reasons and more…

• Their partners represent the current Top 6 in the AP Poll.
• They have Houston, who is the Cinderella darling, that everyone hopes can break up the Power 5 party in this year’s College Football Playoff.
• They have Tennessee (a client for only 1½ years by the way), the “feel-good” story of the SEC this season. Especially after their Hail Mary win last week in Athens.
• Their other “top mid-major” Boise State is back in the Top 25 (#19).
• Their partners continue to pull out big wins against their competitors’ partners when they need it the most!
  • i.e. See below.

adidas

I would have put adidas at #1 this week if Louisville was able to pull off the upset in Death Valley. Combine that with having four (4) of the Top 12 in the country and a Top 25 upset from one of their “Basketball” schools (Indiana over Michigan State), I was ready to put them over the hump this week…

But one yard stood in the way of that!

Could happen this week if the two big adidas vs. Nike matchups listed below fall in the “Three Stripes” favor.

Under Armour

What started off as a season of great promise for UA’s partners, with Playoff Dreams for one (Notre Dame) and solid seasons for others has not turned out as expected.

• Notre Dame is a shell of what was expected of them in the Preseason.
• Auburn is still turning its wheels trying to rise back into the Top Tier of the SEC.
• Northwestern seems unable to build off of its 10-3 campaign last season with losses at home to Western Michigan and Illinois State, although their win last week at Iowa does stop the bleeding a little bit.
• South Florida, South Carolina and Navy all could make a bowl, but neither have a defining win on the season.

They have only two teams in the current Top 25 (Utah and Wisconsin) and their best team still looks like a year away from truly contending for a conference championship (Wisconsin).

The seeds are planted for 2017, with the new additions of California and UCLA, but they will probably be stuck in third for the remainder of this season.

 

Biggest Brand Winners of Week 5

Winner – Tennessee (Nike)

• Tennessee keeps its SEC (and National) Championship hopes alive with their Hail Mary in Athens, signifying that this could finally be the year for the Orange and White to return to SEC prominence! But Nike is also a big winner in that they seized Tennessee Athletics away from adidas in 2015 and they are seeing some immediate dividends in just their second athletics season together.

Winner – Clemson and Michigan (Nike)

• The two biggest games on the National Stage that pitted Top 10 teams against each other, benefitted Nike the most. Not only did the Swoosh’s newest acquisition (Michigan) beat Under Armour’s newest acquisition (Wisconsin), but one the their brand champions (Clemson) held off the rising star brand of their other primary competitor (Louisville/adidas).

Winner – Washington Huskies (Nike)

• Even though it had to go through one of Nike’s top partners (Washington is also a Nike school), Washington made an absolute statement that they are for real! Under Steve Sarkisian and Chris Peterson, the team seems so close to “breaking the glass ceiling”, but neither was unable to get more than eight (8) wins.
• But this season seemed different, given the amount of preseason hype the Huskies had, but they had not been tested up to this point. This was their chance to prove that the hype was real, which they did and MORE! They throttled the powerhouse who has represented the Pac-12 in the Rose Bowl for three of the last four years! This win has their purple-clad fans calling back to 2001, when the Huskies last won the Pac-12 and beat Purdue in the Rose Bowl.

 

Biggest Brand Match-ups for Week 6

Boston College vs. Clemson; Navy vs. Houston

• Under Armour tries to upset Nike’s Playoff Contenders
• These are two intriguing games because two of the top Playoff contenders are going on the road to play teams that have historically given people fits.
• Chestnut Hill has always been a tough place to play at night and Boston College has been looking for a signature win for the last couple of years. Given that it is also their annual red bandana game, honoring 9/11 Hero Welles Crowther, that stadium will be very loud tomorrow night.
• Navy is always a threat to pull of an upset, due to its efficient Triple Option offense. When it is on, it is hard to stop! With so much being on the line for Houston and the fact that the Cougars are the highest ranked team to visit Navy since 1984, the Midshipmen will be very fired up for this matchup.
• Under Armour sees this as a way to eliminate two potential Playoff Contenders that are under the Nike banner. These could be big games for both these programs and UA moving forward this season.

Tennessee at Texas A&M

• One of the two prominent Nike vs. adidas matchups this Saturday, it will determine who is the greatest threat to end Alabama’s control of the SEC.
• Can Tenneessee keep up its miraculous run and complete their rise back to National Prominence with another road victory in the SEC? It would eliminate one of adidas’s four Playoff contenders and would cement to Nike that the Volunteers should become one of their top collegiate partners moving forward.
• Or can Texas A&M establish themselves as adidas’s top collegiate brand champion? adidas’s commitment to debuting new products and designs with the Aggies has helped them become a force to be reckoned with since moving to the SEC. A victory, on such a national stage, would announce that they are ready to take down Nike’s prized jewel, Alabama in two weeks.

Florida State at Miami (FL)

• This is the game that adidas has been waiting for since it become Miami’s apparel provider in 2015.
• It is also a chance for the Hurricanes to finally return to National Prominence for the first time since 2002. Alumni and fans have been so frustrated that a program with the history that “The U” has, could ever fall to the mediocrity level that it has.
• Forget that Florida State is a Nike brand, forget that they are still reeling from its thumping at Louisville and its loss last week to UNC… FSU is still Miami’s biggest rival! This is game that invokes so much history, passion and hatred that it cannot be ignored.
• In addition, adidas and Miami will be debuting new uniforms that are an ode to the great Hurricane teams of the 80s. Head Coach Mark Richt is trying to return the Miami brand to a time where national championships were not a wishful dream, but an expected certainty.
• On the national stage of Saturday Night Football (on ABC), debuting new jerseys from a National Championship era and facing your biggest rival… Miami (FL) will look to announce that they are back, a threat to the College Football Playoff, a brand reborn.
• adidas hopes that Saturday night, Miami becomes “The U” again.