footbag.org

[Scot Hansen (scothansen)]

Hey all- I thought I'd pull this out and begin a new thread with it.

I think we need to start this idea by figuring out a structure by which to operate on. I suggest appointing Chris Ott (or someone like Chris) as an overall leader, and then a North American leader and a European leader under Chris. (I'm thinking Yves and ???).

The next thing is to coordinate efforts for fundraising and media attention. I'm sure that the directors of all of the tournaments that are being considered for this have already made countless sponsorship proposals and media packages. We need to combine these different manuscripts into one all-encompassing document that sells the TOUR rather than each individual event. Don't get me wrong: each individual event should also have a smaller version of the larger package so that local clubs can try to sell local sponsorships as well. But I think these packages should be worked on together so that there is a certain amount of uniformity and professionalism to them.

In order to do that, we need the following as soon as possible... a list of each tournament, their dates and times, and the specific locations of finals sites. (Yves, PT, Conan, and me? plus Europe) All sites must conform to the minimal standards, which should also be spefically defined (bleachers, beer tent, etc.) Then we need to find someone with the computer skills necessary to put all the info together. For my part, I can help write text for any or all of the documents, but I lack computer skills to make cool layouts and printable formatting.

Once our packages are made, our leader must carry out a plan to get the packages into the right hands. I have two highly qualified people in the Chicago area that have the time and the contacts to make things happen on a global scale, but we need to put the information into their hands first.

Also, I didn't mean to assume on behalf of any names mentioned above. I only dropped those names due to their involvement at last week's meeting and because I think they'd be good at it.

Specifically in regards to a possible Chicago tourney- we like the weekend after the 4th of July so that we can run in conjunction with the Taste of Chicago (the world's largest free festival). However, if that interferes with Portland and the US Open, we would be happy to find a different weekend (maybe in late July) and do it at Navy Pier, which attracts over a million pedestrians every weekend in the summer. Both of these sites, by the way, are COMPLETELY attainable and can help us obtain massive sponsorship dollars!

[Russ Arsenault (Calumniate)]

Alright! Someone who isn't jaded like the rest of us. Money talks, but it doesn't tend to talk to footbag. It's a good idea to get sponsors to hop on a tour though. Red Bull here we come

[Justin Eichenlaub (justin41)]

the idea of an european net tour has been discussed a few times, also at euros in vienna. i think, it will be very hard to attract sponsors in europe. i've just learned, that the budgets are melting and also the concepts for 2008 are already out. so whatever were planning with big-company-sponsorship may have to happen in 09.
however, i do not see the necessity for a big sponsor at the moment.one big plus would be the reputation a sponsor gives to a event (you mentioned RedBull). they are sponsoring everythin in europe that cannot duck quick enough. but they dont give money. they have 8 big events that wear their name and thats it. for my part, almost everything i would set up for a tournament, would be given to me for free. since my club (as most other german clubs) is a member of a (soccer-) association.

if i try to be objective, the sport is not too interesting to watch. i'm really sorry to say that but: we are not beach-volleyball. yes, its spectacular. yes, it looks awesome for a moment. but i doubt jon+jane doe would be interested too much if it was'n for the other stuff around at a footbag event.

so the reasons we talked about an european tour were different. it was all about the players. we do not have trouble with newcomers, there are enough promising talents in germany. but we do have problems with the tournament formats as they are at the moment. too many games, too many lazy "lets play in an hour" and too much booze going on.

[shit, gotta get to work NOW!, i'll continue from there...]

i agree on the forming of a concept for promoting footbag-net. making a professional appearance and more strict format to play is on top of my list. formatting a nice layout is not too big a deal. getting attention for a tourney was not too hard either but to finally make them spend money for a reason was. so the point in my case was: what will a possible sponsor actually get from giving us money. i made some nice and professional looking pdf's using ad-lingo such as "street-credibility" and other youth-targeted formulations (obviously the opposite of professional sport, but it was about freestyle too...). i had hours of talking to people from companys that were pretty interested but it always went towards the question "whats in for my company". why should they rather invest in an unknown sport (with a hard-to-spell-and-articulate-name for non-english-natives) than sponsoring jerseys for a local soccer-team.

i dont know whether my post here will be very helpful on the topic. i just wanted to share my perspective. (i guess theres not too much news that havent been discussed already.)

afterall i will be available for anything i can contribute. especially regarding a new, lighter, format and ranking system, collecting and posting results.
i really think that the first step of making a succesful "tour" would be discussing a format that fits the players. next would be adjusting the game to something more spectator-compatible. one idea would be altering the scoring system, another to modify the bag. but thats a different topic again.

i made up a system about a year ago which was close to the beach-volley-tour. i have it on a dvd somewhere.

[gotta actually work for a sec]

alright, back.

a european tour then would be:
finland, germany, france and ??? slovenia? czech rep? switzerland? austria? i dont know.. i dont see any obvious number-4-nation.

j.

[Ludovic Lacaze (ludo88)]

France is big enough to organize 2 events : one in paris and 1 in montpellier, but here in france you can forget about red bull, it's prohibbited to sell here, so no sponsorship in france.

Bu i think we all be very happy to organize a european tour which can also be : finland, germany, france and euros.

Ludo

[Justin Eichenlaub (justin41)]

[Steve Dusablon (dusablon)]

I think the obvious choice for sponsorship would be a shoe company.

I was thinking of making a mock commercial (I am in film school) for the new Nike shoes that are all the rage now for net players. I could then present this commercial to Nike (which is in Oregon) as an example of how cool footbag net could be for shoe sales.
Sadly I am still duct taping my old Beasts together and most of the other players around PDX are nursing older sneakers as well. We would all have to like and buy these new shoes before I could roll cameras.

just an idea,
Steve

[Scot Hansen (scothansen)]

A shoe company like Brooks, New Balance, or Nike would be great, but difficult to land I think. I think a better idea would be a beer company- something like Heineken- it's available everywhere, they have the money, and beer sales at the events would allow them to expect real revenue from the events- not just a silly little banner and an announcement on the PA.

But speculating about what company would be the best misses the point of this thread. We need to create a professional-looking presentation to give to potential sponsors first. Without that, all we have is speculation.

I would be willing to throw together some text and provide a sample of a sponsorship package I had put together in 2003 (which, by the way, landed me $2000 in cold hard cash), but someone else needs to volunteer to take the text and find the good pictures to put with it and lay it out. (Like I said before, I lack computer skills.)

But beyond that, we need good video to add to the package that shows tournaments taking place that ALREADY meet the minimal standards. A video showing a bunch of awesome spikes in the park with no crowd will get us nothing. It's entirely possible that we will need to run these events with the crowds FIRST in order to make the necessary videos for the sponsorship package. The reality is that we might have to continue to run these events individually until we are able to put together a good enough package to truly sell it. However, that just re-inforces the need to get organized and put together consistently professional-looking events.

[Grischa Tellenbach (grischa.tellenbach)]

I like the idea of a fake commercial. Thanks to the internet this kind of communication has proved quite successful in recent years.

G*

[Justin Eichenlaub (justin41)]

[P.T. Lovern (ptlovern)]

[Christopher Siebert (conan)]

Thanks for thinking of us Scot. Yes, we actually have been looking at the weekend of July 5-6, 2008 for the next US Open. But we probably won't confirm that for a while. Anyone who is motivated and starts organizing early can claim dates, in my opinion.

Also, don't forget Funtastiks in the list of quality tournaments. They have been running a professional footbag event for 20+ years now.

[Cory Current (cdcurrent)]

should we compile a list of 'obvious' tourny's & thier 'logical' or general dates? I say logical or general....just meaning they are historically happening around these time frames:

April:
Windchill - Montreal; ??

May:
Green Cup; Memorial Day weekend (end of May)

June:
East Coast; end June?

July:
US Open; early July?
Montreal; early/mid July

August:
World's; early/mid

Sep:
Funtastiks; Labor Day Weekend


That's a decent start, if anyone has thoughts or input or corrections, please let me know.

And, that leaves a few tourny's out of the picture so far.....Chicago, Vancouver, Southern Regionals

Any others?

I guess my point in all of this is to find a good date for the Chicago tourny, so we can get people to come to it. Scot and I *want* to run and put on a quality net tournament next year, but it's incredibly frustrating to do it when nobody shows up. So in the effort to do that, we'd like to nail down a good date that won't confict with other activities, or be *too* close to other tourny's that people are forced to choose 1 or the other.

I think we'd like to choose July, but Monteal is already historically there, and if US Open happens in July, too, that's a lot of tourny's within a few week period, and would also be getting pretty close to the Worlds' time-frame. nobody wants to spend time/money/vacation days to go to a tournament a week before Word's starts, ya know?

So, general people of the footbag net community, help decide on a good date that *YOU* would be able to attend next year.....

-Cory

[Scot Hansen (scothansen)]

The concept of this tour is that it will highlight NET tournaments: that's why I didn't include Funtasticks, East Coast, and Vancouver. All of those tournaments include freestyle and are unlikely to drop freestyle in order to meet the standards of the net tour. I certainly mean no disrespect to those wonderful tournaments, but they are not NET tournaments.

Cory and I are pretty motivated to get going on our end of the tour, and it seems unlikely that there is going to be a good package for the whole tour, so I think we will begin planning the Windy City Open. I don't want to turn this into a thread just about the Chicago tourney, but my connections at Navy Pier have become REALLY REALLY awesome and I think that I will begin discussing the weekend of June 14th and 15, 2008 with them.

[quote]
Justin Eichenlaub (justin41) wrote: plus i am still in favor of considering a less complicated name for the game. but that could then be another thread too.

I couldn't agree more. Let's start a new thread on that...


and...

PT- I think the sponsor would probably want a say in the tour name: something like "The 2008 Brooks Beast Footbag Net Championship Tour". But like Justin suggests, "footbag net" could be replaced with something that doesn't sound so lame. And where is Chris Ott on this???

[Ben Cochrane (footbinc)]

Vancouver is Net Only.

[Steve Dusablon (dusablon)]

At the (totally fantastic, wonderful and spectacular) Vancouver Open, they refer to freestyle bags as "putters".

While Vancouver is an awesome event I think they pride themselves on being somewhat under the radar and low-key. I think Vancouver is a beautiful destination city for a tournament but I highly doubt that they have the recourses (as far as personnel) to mount a full blown uber event.



SO FAR...
It seems like the main difference between the quality of events that happen now and the quality of events we are trying to get to is seating. I agree with what Yves said at the original meeting, that when we show pictures of our sport to potential sponsors we are basically showing them photos of a bunch of people sitting on the grass.
I think if we really pear things down, all we need is a sponsor who is willing to donate cash for bleachers 4 times in 4 cities. When looked at this way I think it makes this goal extremely attainable.
I feel that the usual local sponsors for each respective tournament have proven themselves able to fork up cash for most everything except bleachers. If we continue to get this level of local support (and maybe these local folks would kick in a tad extra if they knew there would be seating for 350 persons in the "Nike" sponsored bleachers.) and just add seats, we could have ourselves a nice little tour.

I wish Mr. Ott would chime in on current progress so we knew more about where we actually stand at the moment...


Steve