NHL Peachy: Gary Bettman, Don Fehr, John Collins, Mark King Conference Call Transcript September 15, 2015 Our Coverage Sponsored by Stribling and Associates
For over 30 years, Stribling and Associates has represented high-end residential real estate, specializing in the sale and rental of townhouses, condos, co-ops, and lofts throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn, and around the globe. Stribling has more than 200 professional brokers who use their respected expertise to provide personalized service to buyers and sellers at all price levels. A separate division, Stribling Private Brokerage, discreetly markets properties over $5 million, and commands a significant market share in this rarified sector of residential real estate. Stribling is the exclusive New York City affiliate of Savills, a leading global real estate advisor with over 200 office in 48 countries.
Check out their listings: http://www.whomyouknow.com/2015/09/remarkable-real-estate-listings.html#.VeiN_flViko
& their most recent State of the Market:http://www.whomyouknow.com/2013/12/remarkable-real-estate-stribling-fall.html
Whom You Know Congratulates their new President, Elizabeth Ann Stribling-Kivlan: http://www.whomyouknow.com/2012/12/breaking-manhattan-real-estate-news.html
***
An interview with:
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN
DON FEHR
MARK KING
JOHN COLLINS
THE MODERATOR: Without further ado, I'd like to introduce the Commissioner of the National Hockey League, Gary Bettman.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Thank you all for joining us today. Our agreement with adidas comes at an incredibly exciting time for the NHL, our clubs and our players. We're coming off another remarkable, exciting, competitive season. We're looking forward to training camps opening this week and preseason games starting on Sunday. But as important as the excitement of the season is, having a great partner like adidas is what we're all about.
So, for starters, we'll partner with adidas and The Players' Association for the World Cup of Hockey, which begins one year and two days from now in Toronto, and as you all know, more than 150 players will stage for our fans the most competitive international hockey tournament ever. And one year later in the fall of 2017 we look forward to our new agreement, the one we're announcing today, our long-term partnership with adidas as the authentic outfitter of on-ice uniforms. A great time for the newest member of the NHL family to join us, as it coincides with our centennial celebration.
Teaming up with adidas continues our strategy of aligning with major partners who not only share our vision for growing the game and the league, but also putting innovation at the forefront of what we do for our players and our fans. The league's relationship with the adidas group stands already more than a decade through the league's existing partnership with Reebok.
Adidas, with its focus on cutting edge, uniforms and apparel is poised to help us continue to extend the reach of our brand and to advance our game. We're also excited that all key events will have adidas connecting with our fans through significant activations and to spur the continued growth of our game. Adidas will work side by side with us on a number of grass roots initiatives. To Mark King and the entire adidas team, we thank you and share your excitement for what lies ahead. This is a big deal for us, and we know it is for you. We think we've chosen each other well, so thank you. With that, I'd like to turn it over to Don Fehr, the Executive Director of the NHLPA. Don?
DON FEHR: Thank you, Gary, and welcome, everyone to this announcement which is pretty exciting. I'm just going to focus very briefly on the World Cup, which as Gary indicated, starts one year and two days from today. It was always, in our opinion, going to be a really big deal, and I think it's shaping up to be precisely that.
This is a new entrance for the NHL and the NHLPA on the world stage, if you will, and we wanted a world class partner with us that is willing to grow with us as we continue to grow the game globally. It's for that reason that the players are particularly pleased and particularly proud to have adidas on board for this event.
It's going to be a great partnership, and it's really going to set us off in the right direction for years to come.
THE MODERATOR: I'd like to introduce the adidas Group North America president, Mark King.
MARK KING: Thank you, Gary. Thank you, Don, and thanks everyone for coming. This is a very exciting day for me personally and for our company. I started a little more than a year ago, maybe 16, 17 months ago and one of the first things on the docket to take care of was the extension of the NHL deal. Here we are today after 16 months of a really wonderful process, and I'll talk about that in a second, talking about the extension of our relationship with the NHL.
One of the reasons, and there are many, that this is a big opportunity for us is just the popularity of the sport, not only in America but in Canada, so North America as a place where this sport is really growing, growing in popularity, whether it's digital, broadcast, and it really gives us an opportunity with the adidas brand to be able to tell sports fans in the largest market in the world that we're a part of this really great game and this really great sport and then to be able to tell our story.
I think this is really going to be a wonderful opportunity for adidas, for the NHL, for the Players' Association, the World Cup of Hockey is a big opportunity for us. So I'll start with saying we're really, really excited.
I told Gary this and John Collins just ten minutes ago in Gary's office, this is a new experience for me personally. I've worked now with all of the leagues over the past year at some level, and we're here today because of a true, and this word gets thrown around a lot, partnership. It's not really meant in most cases. They're called business deals that kind of are masked behind partnerships.
But we're here today because tremendous transparency with Gary and John about what was important to them. I think the same for us to be on ice, to be able to tell our story, to be able to associate with this growing game and league, and I would just say on behalf of the negotiation, it was done with integrity and transparency and honesty. We really, I think, have an opportunity to do some really cool things from a brand and a league that's going to benefit the fans and the players and everyone that touches the league. So really proud of the work that we've done together.
This is a big deal for adidas, and people might ask what, is the deal with Reebok, and again, we were just talking. We have one company, and that is the adidas Group, and we have multiple brands within the adidas Group and one of those brands is Reebok. For the past decade, when Reebok made a lot of league deals, the deal with the NHL was one of those. Well, in 2010 the Reebok brand really made a pivot really out of sport into fitness. And you might say there is an overlap between the two, but Reebok is really focused on fitness and the consumer there is the fit gen consumer, someone who exercises or has exercise as a part of the way they live their life.
So for us this is a real opportunity to put the brands in sync, and in sync would be the Reebok brand is focusing on things like CrossFit, Spartan races, UFC, things that directly relate to the fitness category.
Adidas is about sport. It's about the games we play and the games we play that fans love to watch. We're about performance equipment, and we have all kinds of things. I think it was one of the reasons that Gary and John were excited about us, fabrications around jerseys and different things on tracking information, and things that we're going to be exploring together, and that's really what adidas does to help athletes perform better.
Yes, it's a jersey, but there is more technology in a jersey than you would think. I think that is something we can look at as we go forward.
So we really think the adidas brand benefits greatly because of the association of sport, and it really allows us to focus the Reebok brand on fitness. So for us it's a way to put these brands in sync.
The other thing that people might not understand is that the adidas Group is very committed to hockey. We own the CCM brand, and this relationship allows us to continue to have CCM and their products and their equipment on ice. And we really believe that the combination of adidas through sport, CCM, through equipment allows us to make a really, really strong and meaningful impact in the sport of hockey.
Last week we announced Connor McDavid the No. 1 pick from the Edmonton Oilers, which is exciting. In the next two weeks, and I know you'll ask this question, we have more signings that we'll be announcing, superstars in the NHL in the next couple of weeks. So we are very, very committed to sport in North America, and sport in North America at the top of that list is hockey. So it's really, really important to us.
The last one, and Don talked about it just a few minutes ago. The World Cup of Hockey was one of the really interesting elements for us because the adidas brand almost more than any brand in sport is global. And as the World Cup of Hockey next year will be the first year, but as it grows and expands and it goes around the world, and as Gary said, one of the things he really was looking for in a partner was the ability to take the hockey message and the NHL message around the world. And we're really poised to be able to help the NHL and the sport of hockey be exposed around the world.
So we're really excited about next year. The format is interesting. So, Don, we're looking forward to working with you and Gary and the NHL and thanks for having us today. It's a big, big deal for adidas.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Mark. Thank you, Don. Thank you, Gary.
Q. Gary and Don, I was just wondering, gentlemen, does this open the door to possibly seeing advertising on jerseys? It's hard to imagine that the revenue stream that you can look past forever.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Actually the over and under as to when that question was going to be asked was just bet (laughing). The fact of the matter is, and I've been fairly vocal on this over the last few years as the subject has come up, we are not currently considering putting advertising on NHL jerseys. There have been no discussions formally or informally with anybody about doing that. And you can read all my prior quotes, and what it would even take to get in that dialogue.
With respect to the World Cup, we've had some discussions about it, but there is nothing imminent right now.
DON FEHR: This is Don, let me follow up on that a bit. I don't disagree with anything Gary said except to add the following or I just want to add the following: And that is what the World Cup does, as well as other international events when we get to the point of getting those accomplished, is to give us, among other things, an opportunity for some experimentation. An opportunity, if we want to, to try different things.
So the direct answer to the question is, as Gary suggested, but from the players' standpoint, my obligation is to explore all avenues and then consult with the players and make some judgments.
Q. So you're not ruling it out?
DON FEHR: The direct answer to the question is as Gary said, if that becomes a subject of real consideration, everybody's going to know about it.
Q. Aside from the issue of advertising on uniforms, there's been a lot of speculation about the adidas branding on the uniforms when the new deal takes effect. Will the adidas logo appear in the same spot on the uniforms where the Reebok logo currently appears on the rear neck line? Is there any consideration being given to other adidas branding on the jerseys or uniforms whether it's three stripes or anything else?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: John Collins our chief operating officer is more than happy to respond to those questions.
JOHN COLLINS: We didn't specifically reference it in the deal. We have the flexibility of working closely with adidas to figure out what represents the brand best and what represents the new design of the uniforms.
Q. So are you saying no decision has been made in terms of the answers to those questions?
JOHN COLLINS: No final decision.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: That's consistent with the branding from Reebok to adidas isn't changing right now. So for this season, the Reebok will stay on the sweaters.
Q. Right. I think we all understand this deal takes effect for 2017 season, right?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Correct.
MARK KING: I think the important thing for us and the terminology that we use is we're on ice. We'll both have players in the locker room. We'll be looking at the jerseys and how we construct them and where we put the logo. How do we bring technology to them. It was really an easy one to not finalize because I think what we wanted to get accomplished and the NHL wanted to get accomplished, we got there in such a nice way that we feel really good that we'll figure this out for the best solution.
Q. Two questions, a quick one to start with. I'm a little confused with the dates. Are you saying it starts in 2017 so the next two seasons will still be Reebok? And the other question about the jerseys as well not advertising, but you mentioned a lot of new technology for those jerseys, can you be more specific what kind of technology and what kind of new technology specifically would go into hockey jerseys?
MARK KING: One of the things we're looking at, first of all, the hockey jersey is very traditional and very much a fabric of the game and I think the integrity of that is very important to the NHL, The Players' Association and the game. So this would be something that we'd move more slowly on.
But if you look at what we do in football, U.S. football we use this Tech Fit technology, which is really light, and a fit closer to the body. It allows more mobility and freedom. So that would be the No. 1 technology that we'd look at. It's a dramatic shift from where the uniform is today, but that would be probably the first thing that we'd look at. It really is the weight of it. It's much lighter and it allows more flexibility and mobility.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: As to your first question, our agreement with the adidas Group through Reebok has this season and one more to run. So clearly for this season, Reebok will be the brand identified on the uniforms. Whether or not we change branding a season earlier is something we'll discuss and it's a whole host of factors that is something we don't mean to bore people with, but it has to do with making sure there is enough inventory and dealing with the variety of mechanical things that we'd have to deal with in order to effect changing it early if we chose to do that.
Q. Can you give us more details on the World Cup and how it's going to operate?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: We can give you- we had a fairly extensive media event last week in Toronto, and instead of taking everybody through that again we can give you the press kit that we used last week which will give you all the details you need.
Q. Can you talk about the state of the hockey sweater in your eyes? Obviously, adidas went through the NBA with the tank tops and changing a little bit to the sleeves. Can you talk a little bit about what - you're not going to change things, but just to maybe make it easier for people to wear hockey jerseys or are you perfectly fine with how people wear hockey jerseys?
MARK KING: Well, the last time I played hockey was in Green Bay in 1977, so it was a while ago. So I haven't had the jersey on in a long time. But personally for me, I think that if the NHL is going to look, and we haven't explored this at all levels and really reinventing the jersey, I think there are all kinds of places where it could end up. Because of lightweight, because of different fabrications, Tech Fit would be - just look at Miami's, University of Miami and Arizona State and some of these jerseys - that would be the logical place to go. But it completely changes the look of the hockey player.
So to me it would be something that we'd explore, but I think that would be led by the NHL, not by us. That's what I would say.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Just to add, I think everybody agrees that the history, tradition and respect that goes with NHL sweaters is something that we and adidas are very respectful of. So reinventing isn't something that we're about to embark upon, but if there are better fabrics that are more comfortable and help performance, that's one thing. But we happen to like our jerseys a lot, and we think our fans do as well as evidenced by the fact that when you go to one of our games and you see how many people are actually wearing club jerseys.
Q. I had a question about this deal coinciding with the centennial. When the Reebok deal hit after the lockout in '05-'06, there was a radical redesign of the jerseys and that sort of thing, and that kind of came with the new technology. Can we anticipate a pretty widespread redesign of the jerseys coinciding with the centennial? Not anything radical, but some visible difference in the jerseys when adidas takes over?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: I think the way you posed your question, and it was your question is are we going to do something that is going to coincide with the centennial as a marketing event? The fact is there may be centennial jerseys to commemorate the centennial, but what we do with the sweater, and it goes to the way I answered the prior question, we have incredible respect for the history and tradition of our sweaters.
If there are new things that we can do to help performance, but in large measure protect and adhere to what we've developed over time historically and that our fans love, then we'll try to integrate and incorporate that technology. But we're not looking to revamp our jerseys.
Q. Just wondering about the length of the deal, which is seven years, which I believe takes us to 2023?2024, the collective bargaining agreement I think expires after the 2022 season. If for some reason there were to be a labor stoppage and the season were to be wiped out, would that year carry over or would that extend the deal by a year?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Really? You know, under our existing deal, the Force Majeure clause applying to any sort of Force Majeure had these deals roll over for a year. I haven't even looked at the term sheet on that, which will tell you how focused I am on the next round of collective bargaining.
You know what? If we deprive the partner of the year in the ordinary course, the right thing to do would be to give them that year. But really based on how well Don and I are working together, the partnership in the World Cup, I'm hoping that when this collective bargaining agreement expires we're looking at how we continue the momentum we've created, not how we deal with problems that some suggest might occur.
DON FEHR: I'll only add what I've said in response to that question over the last couple of years, it's a very long way away. And we can prognosticate as to what's going to happen then, but it's not a very good effort, and it's not one which is very productive. In the meantime what we need to do, as evidenced by the World Cup and other things we're doing together, is to make this game grow so much, and to be on such a roll that nobody will even think about such things, so that's my hope.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: I'll agree to that completely.
Q. Two-part question: How much for the first major North American pro sports league that actually puts corporate advertising on its jerseys, how much flow back do you think there will be to that league? And even though you say the league hasn't had formal or even informal talks about this, I wonder if you canvas your 30 owners who are struggling or trying to grow revenue always, dealing with the Canadian Dollar that's seen some pretty steep declines over the last year, what is your sense of what your owners think of a revenue opportunity like that?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Our owners are always interested, as Don indicated, and so are the players, in new revenue opportunities. I don't think there are people sitting out there because the Canadian Dollar has declined to the U.S. Dollar that they should go out and license uniforms. It goes to the respect we have for the history and tradition of our game. The reverence that fans have for our sweaters and our game, and our sweaters, I think among all the sports, are iconic which is why previously I've been quoted as saying we certainly won't be the first.
You'd probably have to deal-drag me kicking and screaming, which would take a lot, a lot of money, and it's something we're not considering right now. Whether or not we choose to, as Don said, experiment with the World Cup, maybe something else, but I think the view that I've just articulated is consistent overwhelmingly with how most owners feel.
Q. Can you say that no one, either inside or outside the league has been asked to try to put a number against what the league would be able to generate this way?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: I think people have speculated as to what a number might be, but I don't believe that anybody's focused on a particular number other than me saying it would take a lot, a lot, a lot of money to do.
Q. Have you even asked anybody to come up with a figure?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: The fact is we know what exposure is worth, okay. So in terms of whether it's our boards or even the exposure that Reebok currently gets on the uniform, we understand what eyeball is worth. So can somebody go through that math and come up with a number? The answer is probably yes. But that's not something we're interested in doing right now. Now you can answer that if you'd like to.
JOHN COLLINS: Look, we always try to understand the value that we bring to a partner. And of course we have a sense of what we think that value could be or should be. We haven't tried to quantify it by going out into the marketplace. You're worth what someone's willing to pay you ultimately, not what you think you are.
Frankly, there was a lot of chatter about the value of being on the ice, and it was really, I think, a big leap to go automatically to jersey sponsorship when, in fact, Mark made it a major, strategic point in our discussions that part of why it is this deal is they want to be on the ice and they wanted to be in the locker room, and they wanted to be there in an exclusive way. They also want to be exclusive at sporting goods.
So we tried to understand from Mark what the key priorities were for adidas and structure our deal in that way. I think the value of the deal, while we're not talking dollars, is significantly up not just from this deal but from the entire model I think we've put in place. So I think there is a sense that we've achieved some of that value that we were looking for.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Let me be a little clearer. There have been some suggesting that this deal means it's inevitable that there will be advertising on uniforms and that's just not true.
MARK KING: But the league does reserve the right to put ads on the jerseys.
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: We reserve the right to do lots of things we don't do.
Q. Including that?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: If we choose to. But as I said, this deal does not mean that's going to happen. We've always had the right to do that. I don't think it's accurate to portray this deal as the appetizer or the inevitability of advertising on jerseys coming, because as I said, that's just not the case.
Q. Mark, when adidas has said in the past one of the reasons they didn't want to renew with the NBA is it wasn't helping drive sales. Can you help us understand what might be different about the NHL deal and how, specifically, that might be a different case that's been discussed between yourself and the NHL?
MARK KING: Yeah, first of all, I think if you're going to be in a partnership, it's two ways. Let me deal with the NBA really quickly. We certainly pursued the NBA for many, many months and couldn't come to a reasonable agreement that we thought was good for them and good for us, and we walked away from the deal.
This deal we have been looking at now for maybe two years, and I think in fairness to the NHL, they've really looked at different models, and John pushed us from the beginning and first meeting we had, which was maybe 14 months ago, what was really important for us and we started to talk about whether it's grass roots programs in Canada, grass roots programs here, on ice, on jersey, in the locker room, which we didn't have, some different exclusivities in the marketplace we didn't have. So we came out of this with a completely different, but a different model than we had prior to this as did they.
And I think association with sport for a sports brand is really important. So if there's been something written that leagues are not important to us, it's just not the case. Leagues at any price don't work. But we need to have associations with the major leagues, and especially a league like this which is really, really, it is the sport in Canada, which we have a massive business. Michael Rossi runs our adidas business in Canada.
You couldn't imagine a sports brand in Canada without hockey as part of it, and it's growing at every level here in the States so this was really an important deal for us. So as you look at the business side of this, not just the branding side but the business side, this has been a wonderful, lucrative relationship for us and will continue to be.
Q. Gary, from your perspective dealing with adidas on this, I know maybe from their perspective how it helps their brand. But can you talk about it?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: We're really important to them and we like that. They're very focused on us. They're committing a tremendous amount of resources, internal resources to our brand to help grow the brand and the game. So we felt that whatever opportunities were out there for us, and there were a number, we like staying with the partner we came to the dance with.
DON FEHR: I think to build on what the Commissioner said, you know it's a revenue driver from the market side in the deal, but it wasn't necessarily one of the big priorities. But it was for us. Their strength in Europe and in markets like Russia where they are big hockey markets that are really important to us, we're seeing it with the World Cup and some of the other events that we have, they can really help lead us to grow that global brand, global business potential that the Commissioner has been talking about.
Q. Did you solicit or was there feedback from your other major partners as far as the changeover because there are some top-tier stuff and you have a lot of major partners involved in a lot of things that you do. And will there be a consumer-oriented drive to explain to the consumers who do care to get the changeover, and get those who don't care that there's going to be a changeover?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: Well, as you see with the other sports as well, changeovers on the branding of on ice, on court, on field uniforms happens on a regular basis. The good news for us is in terms of on the supply side and the chain of distribution, Reebok and adidas will be of one. So I think this will be seamless more so than perhaps any of the other transfers that you've seen in some of the other sports.
Q. As far as their interaction with the other partners are they talking about it or has there been feedback with the league marketing partners?
COMMISSIONER BETTMAN: I think everybody respects the adidas brand, so I don't believe that was an issue. And based on the positioning that Mark talked about, about what the Reebok brand now represents and what adidas is, and taking into account what John says in terms of worldwide presence, I don't see how anybody would view this as anything other than a plus.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you to Don Fehr, Gary Bettman, and Mark King for joining us here today on this conference call.
FastScripts by ASAP Sports
NHL.com is the official web site of the National Hockey League. NHL, the NHL Shield, the word mark and image of the Stanley Cup, Center Ice name and logo, NHL Conference logos and NHL Winter Classic name are registered trademarks and NHL Vintage Hockey word mark and logo, Live Every Shift, Hot Off the Ice, The Game Lives Where You Do, NHL Power Play, NHL Winter Classic logo, NHL Heritage Classic name and logo, NHL GameCenter, NHL GameCenter Live, NHL Network name and logo, NHL Vault, Ice Tracker, NHL Mobile name and logo, NHL Radio, NHL Network Radio name and logo, NHL Images, NHL LIVE, NHL On The Fly, NHL Awards name and logo, NHL Draft name and logo, Hockey Fights Cancer, NHL All-Access Vancouver name and logo, NHL Hat Trick Challenge, NHL Ice Time, Ice Time Any Time, NHL Green, Hockey Is For Everyone, Questions Will Become Answers, The Biggest Assist Happens Off The Ice and Because It's The Cup are trademarks of the National Hockey League. All NHL logos and marks and NHL team logos and marks depicted herein are the property of the NHL and the respective teams and may not be reproduced without the prior written consent of NHL Enterprises, L.P. © NHL 2015. All Rights Reserved. All NHL team jerseys customized with NHL players' names and numbers are officially licensed by the NHL and the NHLPA. The Zamboni word mark and configuration of the Zamboni ice resurfacing machine are registered trademarks of Frank J. Zamboni & Co., Inc. © Frank J. Zamboni & Co., Inc. 2015. All Rights Reserved.
