14
Wednesday, June 15, 1988 / University Daily Kansan
Corporations find niche in Big Eight
The Associated Press
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — What do motor oil, blue jeans and potato chips have in common?
The Rig Fight
The Big Eight.
Like many major conferences, the Big Eight is wading increasingly deeper into the waters of corporate sponsorship, and banking bigger and bigger navychecks.
"We have championship events in 20 sports," said assistant commissioner Bill Hancock, who handles corporate sponsors for the Big Eight. "We'd like to have a title sponsor in every one of them. We're a long, long way from all 20. But it will happen some day."
sometime day.
"In 1981, we took in $3,900 from sponsors. That's grown to $91,000 this year, with every penny going into a direct eight-way split among our member schools."
The Big Eight basketball tournament that took place in Kansas City this spring was officially called the Phillips 66 Big Eight Basketball Tournament.
student-athletes who excel in the classroom no longer get named to the Big Eight all-academic team. They are selected to the Lee Jeans Big Eight all-academic team.
To some purists, the Big Eight might as well make a call to Hades to see if the devil might be interested in a soul.
"I have some very good friends who feel that way." Hancock said. "I can understand their thinking."
rinkeec, 37, grew up working for his family's newspaper in Hobart, Okla. He said he recalled his revulsion when he first saw a college football program doing business with a corporate sponsor.
a co-pride potato. "I can't believe it," he said. "That's what I thought in 10 years ago. But times change. In these economic times, saving a sport at an institution, which is to say saving scholarships for young people, can cause your thinking to change."
our thinking to change
Besides, Hancock said, the corporate tie-ins were not what they might seem.
seeth.
"If it's a reputable company that you involved with, it does not change the event," Hancock said. "And I can assure you that the Big Eight is dealing only with top-netch, first-class people and organizations. Corporate America is not evil. If it helps us provide a greater championship atmosphere for our kids and it helps an institution save a sport or be able to come up to NCAA scholarship levels, then it's worthwhile," he said.
Although Phillips Corp. was the title sponsor of the basketball tournament, several other companies were involved to a lesser extent. Corporate banners were a visible detail in Kemper Arena during the three-day event.
"They get signs in the arena and message board advertising." Hancock said. "They get the right to buy some pretty good tickets and parking and the right to use our name. We sell identity as much as anything. In addition, these companies find that an association with college athletics is a healthful thing to have."
Tom Lancaster, vice president for marketing for Lee Jeans, said his company's sponsorship of the Big Eight's all-academic team was not necessarily profitable.
necessarily pronounce
"in our case, you can't say that
we've done it purely from a business
standpoint," he said. "Because if you
put a cost-benefit analysis to it, you
would have a tough time justifying it.
So why do it?
SO WHY? "One consideration, in our case, is an identification with young adults and our product." Lancaster said.
Lancaster's company has several sports tie-ins, including the Tom Watson Golf Clinic every year and a program in which players for the Kansas City Chiefs help tutor inner-city youths.
city younts. Hancock said that no sponsor had ever tried to influence conference policy.
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