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Jeff McCauley from Prep Sports Biz

Jeff McCauley has taught Marketing for 20 years and Sports Marketing for 10 years. During this time he has also started a unique group called Sportainment, the sports marketing program at Bradford High School in Kenosha Wisconsin. This program earned him the Innovation in Marketing Award from the Marketing Education Association as well as national attention from ESPN, USAToday, Advertising Age and Fox News.

In the last year Jeff has published the textbook Sports Marketing: More Than Just The Score and developed curriculum for this Sports Entertainment and Event Marketing. Schools are now lining up to purchase the program and interest in Jeff's program is spreading quickly.

Sportainment trains students for potential careers in sports marketing and operations and has already established proactive and creative high school sports marketing programs across the country.

Many of these schools are now adding contests, promotions and pricey halftime shows to their high school games, once reserved only for the fans in the NBA.

Jeff started with nothing - a logo, business cards, letterhead and a banner made before the board approved the course since he was so excited about the course and content. Now he leads a charge of new high school sports marketing groups who are both training the next generation of sports executives and raising the standard of high school athletics. Jeff joins us for the January Interview and discusses the program and where it's headed.

Gameops.com: What is the background of your Prep Sports Biz?

Jeff McCauley: About 10 years ago a colleague of mine read a one-page article in Sports Illustrative about a high school in Fairfax County, VA that had a Sports Entertainment Marketing Program. We just looked at each other and both said "Now why didn't I think of that?" It's just such a natural. 99 out of a 100 kids are interested in something to do with entertainment. So we flew out there to check it out and see what they were doing. That was about the last time we were together in what we were doing.

What I took from them was the idea, but I totally repackaged it because what I thought the most fun is the hands on. So I came back and said we are going to have a sports entertainment marketing, but we are going to do the marketing for sports. Entertainment then was defined as concerts at the band-shell, to musicians, to a hypnotist. We tried to do things with the band department, but they really had their own system. So we eventually became just sports.

The class now is more of event marketing and the sports element tends to help draw more students to the program.

After a few years I became one of the teachers at the forefront of this curriculum, so I decided that I should produce a text to help teachers and students. Currently I am partnering up with some new projects that should help expand the curriculum. For a long time I just kept hearing from people in the business "Man, I wish they had that program when I was in school." Now I just try to provide the tools so more schools can have programs like this.

Gameops.com: Talk about some of the ideas you used at your high school that were successful and/or sponsorable.

Jeff McCauley: We brought in Ray Clay, the Bulls announcer for our Chicago Bulls night, we had Dennis Rodman night where the weirdest hairdo won tickets to a Bulls game, we had Bald Night in honor of our bald basketball coach (All bald people got in for free), we did a Nerd night in conjunction with a Myron Noodleman appearance. At high school it is all about the fan fun events. We just wanted people to have a good time.

One of the biggest promotions we did was one that Steve Weaver in Portland made famous, the "Run or Pass." This promotion lets the fans select a Pass or Running play. Our coach was a great help and open to letting us try some things, which is essential for this promotion. It didn't hurt that we got ESPN out to cover the promotion.

We also did the play of the game, where a fan drew up a play and at some point in the game the team would run that play. It really drew some great attention to the team and the school.

Gameops.com: You talk in the book a lot about Sponsorship. Where do you see the line between sponsorship and entertainment?

Jeff McCauley: I think that knowing sponsorship is important. If you can generate revenue for a team you can work anywhere, so I really want kids to understand that process. My personality is one of a promoter, so I tend to use sponsorships so I can promote and entertain. Sponsorship often becomes the vehicle to promote and entertain. You can do one without the other.

Gameops.com: So in your school events where you made a profit, where did you put that money?

Jeff McCauley: All back into the program. Our goal is make a profit, but never take a profit. That is, when you make money, you pour it back into the program. Other times we may actually spend money on an event even if we couldn't make it back in sponsorships and use money we made elsewhere to cover it, if it was a good experience for the kids. For example, we used the High Impact Squad one year. We couldn't cover the expense of the team through a sponsorship, but we thought it would be good for the kids to work with them. So we used some money from another project and paid for them.

The money also goes to further our overall athletic program - like new banners, slip covers for chairs, or to our sponsorship. The goal was not to teach the kids how to be a high school marketing person - it was beyond that. The goal is to have them deal with NBA level performers and premium items and learn the business.

I think there are opportunities to really grow high school programs with sponsor revenue, but I was more driven to change the kids than to change the athletic programs.

Gameops.com: In our conversations you have mentioned Bill Veeck and Mike Veeck a couple times. Can you talk about what they mean and how they have shaped the modern sports experience?

Jeff McCauley: I have read a couple books by Veeck, The Hustler's Handbook and Veeck as in Wreck. I think what he did and said was that, "Sports should be for the common man and I as an owner should still be a common man." You read all the stories about Bill Veeck sitting out in the bleachers with his shirt off and his wooden leg out just hanging with the fans. He knew sports were a serious business, but should not be taken seriously, he realized it should be fun.

Baseball could really learn from Bill Veeck now. They watch their numbers drop, but they aren't willing to try things. I think that he also communicated to people that "Fun is good." In fact that was the Saint Paul Saints slogan in the Mike Veeck era.

In one of Veeck's books he talks about how anybody can give away a TV, but Veeck would find a way to give away 200 live clams to some fan and then to sit back and watch what the guy would do with them. Or to give a fan 500 ice cream bars on a hot summer day as a prize.

Even the Pass and Run promotion came from Veeck. Grand Stand Manager's Day back in the 50's he gave out 5,000 signs so fans could instruct the manager when to bunt or run or hit away. Most people think of Veeck as the guy who brought us Eddie Geadel the midget, but he was also responsible for the Ivy at Wrigley Field, for names on the back of jerseys (which the NFL later copied from him), fireworks, Ladies Night, and Bat Day.

As for Mike, the nut doesn't fall from the tree. To see what he's done in minor league baseball is amazing.

Both the Veeck's contributed so much and their passion for entertaining in sports has been passed down through so many people, like the Steve Weaver's of the world, so that it still has a tremendous influence in sports today.

Gameops.com: You mentioned that some of your students have gone on to work in the industry, can you talk about some of their successes.

Jeff McCauley: Yes. The kids have such an edge in the market since they have literally two years experience in sports marketing before they enter college. And for the ones really interested in sports as a career their college experience is much more targeted. They are just much more prepared.

We have had a couple great kids. One is now working for the University of Utah, one at University of Wisconsin, UW- Green Bay, one at UW-Parkside and another is down at the University of Tennessee. Ron Goch (Ron was recently hired as the Vice-President of Business Operations for the Utah Starzz in the WNBA), the athletic Director at University of Tennessee, was an early supporter of our program and he has called me on a couple occasions asking if I have any students. He understands the head start they have coming from a program like ours.

For example, one student went down and worked on the Midnight Madness event running and coordinating with ESPN. Of course he was prepared since he had worked on similar events for 2 years in our program. Now based on his experience he was overseeing some upper-classmen on some projects.

Gameops.com: What other tools are you working on to supplement the text book?

Jeff McCauley: The textbook is an introduction to the world of sports marketing. We are close to completing our web site, including a discussion board so teachers can talk about issues and ask questions. I also have a weekly email (Prep Sports e-Weekly) with topics and discussion points for teachers.

We have worked out some deals with some publishers so I have access to deal on selected books, like the new Pat Williams book on Bill Veeck. I'm also working with some entertainment agents to see if we can develop ways for acts to tap into the high school market, which is a very under served market.

I think the potential is enormous for kids, and we are really just starting to scratch the surface.

Thanks to Jeff McCauley for his time and hospitality. Jeff actually found us here at Gameops.com and has been a frequent contributor to our site for as long as I can remember. After several great submissions I finally had to find out who this guy was....and it was a pleasure to meet Jeff and hear about his program.

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Jeff McCauley from Prep Sports Biz