Since it seems that this is the primary goal of this organization I thought it might be worth having a thread. Has anyone seen a quote or article where someone from the Fire explains, in real terms, what this means? As best as I can guess, what they mean is they want the Fire brand to extend beyond the MLS team and be on peoples mind when they are doing stuff like youth or rec soccer. Beyond that, what else? I guess then the hope is that by expanding the brand like this that it will have some help with growing the fanbase, which in turn, should help provide revenue to help the on-field team? Are there any examples of this type of strategy being successful with other clubs in MLS? Also, we mock this stuff because it is pretty ridiculous, but remember that when asked about the goals of the organization this is always the thing they talk about. Winning is hardly even mentioned. So for those of us that care about winning need to keep in mind that this is the immediate priority.
They can't own the soccer conversation in Chicago because of things like this http://iwsl.com/clublinks.php?title=Clubs that is about 148 soccer clubs in Chicago that have girls teams in the IWSL. I have more personally at stake with the club my kids are in than the Fire. (even though my season tickets cost me about year worth of travel soccer) The club has to win now and make some waves. My 9 would rather watch Liverpool or ManU than a Fire game (front running band wagoner Euro snob that she is)
I actually think this is an essential goal for the club. I wouldn't necessarily word it quite like this but being the primary source of soccer in the city would help the club get through lean times. Being important long term has to involve more than winning. We have to focus on the parts we can control as well. I've been consistent that winning isn't the most important, much less only goal of the club. It's certainly one of the most important goals of the team on the field, although playing with integrity is up there in my opinion. But off the field these things are important. I wouldn't necessarily blame the message. The side of the club that's responsible for off the field actions are taking a positive step by setting a long term goal. I would blame the lack of a president on the lack of positive planning and messaging about the on the field goals. To me this is just another example of how a lack of a president is killing out club.
This is a good way to tie interest in WC2014 & Fire brand together and be a part of the soccer conversation. I hope they ordered enough scarves to give them away at bars too.
Of course it would be nice if the team had someone playing for club and country. SKC had a similar give away promoting Zusi and Besler. Hey, I'm all for stealing good ideas.
Not to be a wise guy but most teams do try to control all the parts they can in order to win. If you aren't winning, then you become irrelevant. And no matter what you try to do, then, goes unnoticed. You want to own the soccer conversation in Chicago, go buy Klose and Mila and Rio. That'll get everyone's attention.
I, too, have never bought season tickets because I would miss most games due to my son's travel schedule.
We did that with Blanco and it only lasted until he was gone. There's more to a club than the players on the field and a stronger club would have lasted longer after Blanco's departure. You can't buy David Beckham every year.
Effort to improve would have gone a long way in keeping fans. Every era comes to an end (although we should have kept Blanco for at least a couple of additional seasons), but the club has to be seen as striving to improve when moving from era to era. United went from Mark Hughes, to Cantona, to Beckham to Keane to Ronaldo . . . to Van Persie to ??? So, Blanco played from 2007-2009. What if WE were the team that signed Thierry Henry in 2010? Imo, we would have built on the success of the team assembled pre-Cakes. -----------------------McBride------------------ ----------Henry---------------------------------- Pappa--------------Ljungberg-------Nyarko-- --------------------Thorrington----------------- Sega------------------------------------Kinney-- ---------------Conde---------CJ----------------- ------------------The Milkman------------------ I would have been first in line to re-up for seasons if I was looking at that line up. Perhaps be a little forward thinking and go out and get Pardo a year early to take Thorrington's spot.
When you go to work or out with friends, you rarely (or seriously) talk about the teams that are about to be relegated from top Euro leagues. Winning is the first thing top teams talk about. It's #1 on any teams list of ambitions. Sure theres more to it but we, the STHs shouldn't be worried about much else. I am, but we shouldn't be. This isn't a European league so every team can say winning is the #1 priority. Three examples are from right here in Chicago (in no order): #1. The ********ing Blackhawks. How the team was run was a huge complaint but how it was run was directly linked to it's failure on the ice. The new owner came in and basically said they would win NOW and we love you. The change of ownership did something the previous had been failing to do...keep the players responsible for winning at the club. Sure, the bad years got them the 3 main players who hold that responsibility but the old owner would have dumped them the second they asked for more than a few mil a season. #2. Michael Jordan & Air Jordans "I wanna be like Mike" doesn't refer to a shitty player or a loser. It refers to probably the greatest player ever and someone, while in his prime, won a shit ton. Sure it was a Gatorade and not Nike commercial and of course it meant to do things in spectacular fashion (before he even won a championship) but today it means to simply be great (if anything) and the greatest players normally win something. This is one of the easiest and hardest fixes; to sign a player similar to this calibre. A player that can do so much on and off the pitch simply because soccer finds him and people come just to see him do 20 keepy-ups. #3. The worthless ********: Marion Hossa Theres no bigger failure than Hossa appearing in 3 straight Finals, losing 2 and then riding the coattails of those "younger" players he made reference to when he signed only to all but completely disappear in the playoffs and could have been replaced with an orange cone in a hawks jersey and the outcome would have probably resulted in better points production during the 2010 finals. Hossa, for 2 teams in 2 years was a statement signing. Big clubs do that. He wasn't necessarily the catalyst that single handedly sparked a teams rise to the top. He just happened to be one of the top players available at the right time. How many different talented to big time players are available every year in this sport for free and we have 2 transfer windows a year to sign them? You want to own the soccer conversation in Chicago? Give me something to talk about other than how many back passes can the Fire do in one half or "did you see the Fire blow another 2 goal lead last night and drop points?"
Using Google Trends for the Chicagoland area with the terms Chicago Fire, FC Barcelona, Manchester United, and Real Madrid from today to May of 2007 you can see some alarming statistics (focus on sports category only to avoid any cross over from the show). In 2007 was our highest search volume and was double or triple the other clubs. Our search volume has gone down but the competitors have surged. Current/2007 Fire 31/33 (July with Blanco arrival we hit 52) United 72/25 Barca 74/8 Real 94/11 Another interesting metric is the regional interest. City of Chicago is one of the smallest search volume areas, the south suburbs (Plainfield/Orland Park) and west suburbs (Naperville/Elmhurst/Wheaton) do better than the city. We've heard so much about 'young urban professionals' being the key to MLS business, and this is certainly lacking for the Fire. So we can see that the interest in the game has increased dramatically and yet the Fire has not become any more relevant in the community, in fact they are less relevant. Going by the past 12 months, these are the teams that are more popular than the Fire within Chicago... Manchester United Real Madrid Arsenal Liverpool Chelsea Club America Fire was more popular than Bayern Munich Atletico Madrid AC Milan PSG Cruz Azul Juventus Inter Milan Chivas (yep) So as of now the Fire are more popular in Plainfield then they are in Chicago, and are the 7th most popular soccer team in Chicagoland area (down from #1 seven years ago). The Fire use to own the conversation, they don't anymore.
So you're saying our search volume was the same as it was under AEG/Wilt and that constitutes an "alarming trend"? Ok. People who have been paying attention have already noticed our popularity has remained roughly the same over the years.
"What I mean by that is we want to be part of the soccer ether." AK 4/2014 I believe this plan was slightly misunderstood and instead of attempting to be part of the ether we have instead instructed the entire technical staff to do all of the ether provided to them by Andell. "There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge...This is the main advantage of ether: it makes you behave like the village drunkard in some early Irish novel...total loss of all basic motor skills: Blurred vision, no balance, numb tongue-severance of all connection between the body and the brain. Which is interesting, because the brain continues to function more or less normally...you can actually watch yourself behaving in the terrible way, but you can't control it....What's happening here? What's going on? Then you hear yourself mumbling: "Dogs ********ed the Pope, no fault of mine. Watch out!...Why money? My name is Brinks; I was born...Born? Get sheep over side...women and children to armored car...orders from Captain Zeep." -HST, 1971
I work in the media/marketing business and yes any client I have ever worked with would say that this is alarming. If you were the most popular search engine in 1995 and by 2002 you were the 7th most popular, actually lost some users, and your competitors were quadrupling your traffic then its time to sound the alarm. If you work in any industry that has radical market growth (as pro soccer has) and you have lost significant market share, then you have failed. If I were to put together an analysis for these numbers it would really be puzzling. With such huge gains (300-700% among multiple competitors) you would think there would be some spill over. If even 10% or 15% of these new local Euro fans were also becoming Fire fans then they should have rode that wave of popularity (rising tides kinda thing). There should be some bump to see it but in fact there is no bump. Either the Fire is not retaining any of the new fans or they are capturing some of these new fans but they are just replacing older fans that are leaving the club. Either way there are issues and huge opportunity lost.
As I understand it, what they mean by "Owning the soccer conversation" isn't so much about being the most talked about club in Chicago. As you point out, thats almost going to be impossible in the short term, given the realities of international soccer. Not even the Galaxy pass your "local team/United/Barca/Madrid" test. What they do want is what Kholsa said. They want to essentially have their hand in or around everything soccer-related in Chicago. Advertising, Sponsoring, Funding, Owning, Hosting, etc. In other words "owning the soccer conversation" means if you want to play/watch (live) soccer in Chicago, you're going to run into the Fire brand somehow. If I had to guess growing the academies and the PDL would be a big part of that. Getting them involved in local soccer things. The planned soccer center is obviously aimed at that. Its a giant Fire billboard basically. I guess they do organize some soccer tournaments, that's part of it. The ad campaign is part of it. I'm not saying they are doing a good job at it, but lets not fault them for failing to do something that isn't their plan either.
Exactly. Whatever problems the Fire have with drawing interest, it's a global problem affecting most of the older franchises, not particularly controllable by local management. Just goes to show that no matter how much you spend or what you do, there are a lot of external constraints on how well you do.
I've used some high tech marketing analytical software at work to basically ******** around and search how the Fire have fallen from any relevancy they ever had. I'd share it, but I also like my job and living in a house.