Am I Nuts...Again?

Another Super Bowl has come and gone and we are no closer to having a bowling commercial on the Big Game (watched this year by only 108 million people) than we were last year.

This year, I had an opportunity to interview for a BPAA Board position and as we went through the various interviewee type questions, I was informed that the mission statement of the BPAA was to increase the proprietor’s profitability.

I buy that lock stock and bowling glove, but what’s gonna happen to Larry the proprietor who can’t afford to even advertise in his home town and , unfortunately, when he does some hot shot media person gives him a schedule that just doesn't make it. Based upon his poor results, he vows never to do cable TV again. Same thing happened to him with Radio and, of course, Newspaper. Never again

So now Larry is locked and loaded into the Internet, into email, into twitter and SEO and all that good stuff and maybe 10% of the people he sends stuff to actually read it?  And less than half take some action

There’s only one problem.

SALES ARE NOT GOING UP. PROFITABILITY ISN'T GOING UP. NOTHING’S REALLY CHANGING

Will a super bowl commercial fix our industry’s woes? No, of course not, but maybe people will start to say. “Oh yeah, bowling, I used to do that. Let’s go and do it after the game, next Friday night. Whenever. It is now in someone’s brain; maybe 108 million brains.

Commercials this year cost $4,000.000 for a 30 second spot and production costs about $200,000 per spot. If we’re a $4 billion dollar industry at retail, then $4.2 million is ONE TENTH OF A PERCENT…and I am told it is too expensive; that it won’t make a difference; that it’s a waste of money.

Do all those Hyundai, Pepsi and Chrysler people think that?  On the world’s biggest stage, some of the world’s biggest advertisers come to perform. Some stay on the side line.  But its easy to see that Hyundai sales and Chrysler sales are leading (or near the front of the pack) in year over year increases

Too bad the sport with more pay for play participants than anything else in the USA sits woefully on the sideline holding its head in its hands thinking about the next “8 for 8” bowling league instead of figuring out how to use some Pepsi money or Smart Buy money to get on stage and show our stuff.

Like we said in our old school days, "Just wait 'till next year."

Am I nuts?