UTAH FLASH

Issue

Late last year, the NBA awarded Utah entrepreneur Brandt Andersen rights to the newest NBA Development League franchise. Now known as the Utah Flash, the team will be affiliated with the Utah Jazz and Boston Celtics. With its inaugural season approaching, the team faced the dual challenge of communicating its brand and selling season tickets amidst competition like BYU basketball and even the Utah Jazz.

Solution

The Flash turned to PPBH to determine a strategy for the campaign. While TV and radio were attractive considerations, the Flash needed to focus on the core market of Utah County. PPBH targeted Utah County’s huge theater-going masses with extensive movie-theater campaigns, leveraging the campaigns to negotiate grassroots added-value that enabled the Flash to build its database of customers during big Transformers and Harry Potter weekends. PPBH is also running an aggressive paid and content search campaign that has brought several thousand Utah County visitors to the Flash season ticket page. The campaign is also strategically placed in print publications. On July 19th, the Provo Daily Herald ran a special Utah Flash section that was negotiated and monitored by PPBH.

Results

The Flash has sold over 3000 tickets to date, more than any other first-year Development League team in history.