On Nov. 9th approximately 20 members of Real Salt Lake’s first official supporter’s club, the Loyalists, met with Trey Fitz-Gerald, the Senior Director of Marketing & Communications for RSL. He discussed upcoming events and decisions about the team and answered Loyalists’ questions for about 45 minutes. Here is a summary of what he discussed. For the complete article, please go to www.TheLoyalists.com where the article will be available soon. It is unlikely, according to Fitz-Gerald, that jerseys will be available in time for the Christmas season. He will be meeting with Adidas in the coming week to get things rolling in that area. Jerseys will probably be available in late February. More window clings and merchandise should be available soon. New designs are also on their way. Response from the local soccer and sports merchandise stores has been very positive, so fans can expect to see RSL merchandise available most places locally. If you know of anywhere locally that should be carrying RSL merchandise and isn’t, contact the front office to let them know. Season tickets are selling very well so far. They are already approaching the levels that some established MLS teams currently have. Since this has happened with no advertising and simply a logo and name to sell the team, the front office expects these sales to continue to grow as time progresses. Season ticket sales should get a boost from holiday offers, fans who see how the expansion draft turns out, etc. The goal is to have about 6,000 season ticket holders for the 2004 season. Fans can also watch for other marketing to start soon. Besides the holiday ticket packages, there will be TV, radio and print advertisements visible in the near future. The real marketing campaign can be expected to start sometime in January.
Correction: 6,000 is not the goal for the 2004 season, since there IS NO 2004 season. That's the goal for the 2005 season!