"If you are not moving forward, you are moving backwards."
Larry Bohannan nabs a rare sit down with Commissioner Tim Finchem to talk about the demise of the once great event known as the Bob Hope Classic, and it's nice to know that the MBAspeak isn't confined to press conferences.
On the move to The Classic Club:
"If you are not moving forward, you are moving backwards. This tournament for a long time sort of set the bar in a lot of ways toward charitable giving, going back to the 1970s," Finchem said. "They need facilities that they can use to effectively market the tournament in today's world.
"You see all the other sports building new facilities. These facilities allow us to give the customer, the fan, a better experience."
Yeah it really looked like it the last two years!
And regarding the pro-am...
"I'm not so sure that the experience for the amateurs here can't be even more effectively marketed. It has been effectively marketed through the years."
Today's key phrase, effective marketing. As opposed to mere marketing. This man makes $7 million a year!
On the Nationwide Tour caliber field...
"From a field standpoint, you always have in a multi-day pro-am, whether it is here or Pebble Beach, you've got some players who like that format and some players who don't," Finchem said. "That is always going to continue."
But Finchem said it's important to look at the field as a legitimate PGA Tour field even if some stars are absent or avoid the event.
"The tour as a whole continues to get stronger and stronger. The fan base is getting bigger. We've got more stars. Here you've got some international players sprinkled in, I'm glad to see Phil make his debut after five months off this week."
Yep, stronger and stronger, that's why there were more world ranking points available in the Persian Gulf than Palm Springs. Fan base bigger? More stars? Uh huh.
On The Golf Channel GOLF CHANNEL and the new TV deal:
"We are going to learn more after the first couple of years of this new schedule.
First couple of years? More like first couple of months.
We see good underlying trends with the Golf Channel. We like their presentation. We think it is getting better."
One key to the new deal is the potential for growth for Golf Channel, which currently reaches about 75 million homes.
"We like the way their distribution is going. We think we are on track for them to be in 90 million homes by '09," Finchem said. "By that time, all of the fan base of the sport will understand where the Golf Channel is. And that creates a really good base for us."
It's all about the base!
Wednesday, January 24, 2007 at 07:52 PM 11 Comments | in 2007 PGA Tour, Bob Hope Classic, PGA Tour, Tim Finchem
Reader Comments (11)
If your last 4 year deal was worth a Billion with the networks and you ink a 6 year deal and don't reveal what thats worth you've definitely moved backwards.
If your product is televised on ESPN with 3.8 ratings and you move your product to GOLF CHANNEL and can't manage a 1.0 your moving in the wrong direction. Keep moving, but don't keep going in the wrong direction. What a marketing bafoon Finchem is.
Goooood God, you guys are brutal! I'll bet you all think he has a special deal with PODS, I know I do.
Whatever the case, it does point to the difficulty golf is having worldwide in striking a balance between the money and the social aspects of golf. Consider the Hope itself: it hangs on as a pro-am, a kind of ultimate play-with-the-pro, when all the other factors are pushing the tour to standardize it to attract a better field.
As for socialism, we've actually got a liberal government since last September, and today was the first pay-day under the new tax system. It was happy reading to check out the new account balance! Still, paying sixty dollars a month to watch a cactus/waterfall for one third of the telecast, a leaderboard for another third (we don't get your features, interviews and booth conversations) is just not going to happen.
Commissioner, I knew the fan. I spectated with the fan. Commissioner, you're no fan...
I know that I held off getting The Golf Channel (there, I did it the old way, and it felt GOOD) for about three years, because I didn't want to pay the additional $30ish dollars a month to get The Golf Channel via the "Digital Premium" package that was forced down my throat by Adelphia (RIP)...evidently others feel the same way...
Mr. Finchem's MBA minions should probably come down from the castle to do some primary focus group research and gauge customer perceptions of their brand, its value proposition and their experience delivery channels...{English translation: They need to find out how many people aren't buying their "brand/product" because they have chosen an expensive alternative to free, over the air network programming.}
(1) Could we please lighten up a little on the Golf Channel-bashing? Yes, Finchem talks like the ultimate RoboMBA, but the fact is that this is a long-term arrangement and it makes no sense to leap to dire conclusions in January of year one, especially when considering events the over-air networks don't want. Golf's a niche sport; we don't want to think of it like hockey, because it's OUR niche, but when we're getting clobbered by crap like the X Games, it's smart to try to build your own conduit while you've still got some juice instead of waiting until you crater and then going begging.
(2) As for the seniors and CNBC, nothing was going to stop that tour from tanking once Arnie, Jack, and Lee were replaced by two-name guys you didn't want to watch when they were young.
(3) The Hope seemed like fun when we didn't have an all-celebrities-all-the-time culture, so seeing movie and tv stars playing golf was like getting a behind-the-scenes tour of a Hollywood studio. Today that tour is available 24/7 on E!, and the name pros are rightly leery of four six-hour rounds with multiple amateur partners. I'm all for "giving back to the community," but the millionaire jock-sniffers playing in Palm Springs aren't a community in need of payback. If I were a pro with a choice, I wouldn't go near the place.