The new agreement gives the Times exclusive presence at Tropicana Field for the next four seasons.
By MARK ALBRIGHT, Times Staff Writer
Published August 24, 2006
The St. Petersburg Times has signed a new, four-year deal to become the exclusive newspaper sponsor of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
While the cost was not disclosed, the newspaper publisher is increasing its financial commitment considerably in return for substantially enhanced exposure as one of the team's seven premium sponsors.
That puts the paper on the team's top-tier sponsorship level with Pepsico Inc., Anheuser-Busch Cos., Checkers Drive-In Restaurants Inc., Progress Energy Inc., Kane's Furniture and Tropicana Products, a Pepsico unit that owns stadium naming rights through a separate agreement.
The new newspaper deal, which is similar to the Tampa Tribune's exclusive sponsorship with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, specifies the Times can be the only newspaper with a promotional presence at Tropicana Field and its parking lots.
"We feel the value of the franchise is only going to increase over the next five years and we want to be the only newspaper involved," said Richard Reeves, senior vice president of advertising and marketing for the Times.
"I've always been a firm believer in having a few exclusive partners if they are the right partners," said Mark Fernandez, senior vice president and chief sales officer for the Devil Rays, who previously held a similar post with the Arizona Diamondbacks.
While the team's previous management struck multiple newspaper marketing deals partly to help strengthen its fan base in Hillsborough County, the team's current owners have a different view of how to do that.
"We thought about giving an exclusive for a long time, and we will still take out ads in the Tribune," said Fernandez. "But we feel geography will take care of itself after we offered enhancements such as free parking and improved customer service and put a better team on the field."
The new terms means the Tribune's outfield sign, team promotions and the use of its sports writers in stadium video promotions with players will end next season.
The Times also becomes the first advertiser in Major League Baseball to sign up for a season-long promotional presence on the opening page of a team Web site.
MLB, which runs the interconnected Web sites for all 30 teams, until now has only parlayed nothing longer than multiweek advertising deals for the Boston Red Sox site.
"With over 1.5-billion visitors and more than 11-billion page views to MLB.com and the individual team Web sites, we are confident this sponsorship will provide significant and valuable visibility for Florida's largest newspaper," said Noah Garden, executive vice president for MLB Advanced Media.
In addition to keeping its stadium signs and popular "front-page photo booth," the Times will get better locations for kiosks where it sells the newspaper, subscriptions and advertising and take over promotional control of an outfield bleacher section once called "The Beach."
The newspaper, which staged several home and boat shows at the Trop each year, also committed to stage at least five similar events a year under the new arrangement. One of those will be a recreational vehicle show.
