As many Capitals fans already know, the team has struggled in recent years with attendance. Some of this can be chalked up to the team’s performance, the horrible schedule NHL teams have had to deal with the last several years and perhaps the location of the Verizon Center. But probably more than a little of it has had to do with the Capitals’ marketing campaigns, which have been lacking in recent years. This is especially true of their television ads.

There have been three television ads the Caps have run frequently this year. One features a woman in a tattoo parlor watching a Capitals game and getting the Capitals new ‘W’ logo tattooed on her shoulder; one features a “guy’s night out” theme; one focuses on Chris Clark’s leadership and toughness. Please note that when I refer to these ads I use my own terminology as I do not know for sure what the ads are officially called.

#1 - Tattoo Parlor

I couldn’t find anywhere to download or embed this video, but it can be viewed by going to the Capitals website, going to the Multimedia section, clicking Caps TV and then going to Caps Insider>Commercials and In-Game Features. Here the ad is simply called ‘Tattoo’.

For those of you who have not seen it and don’t want to load it up, here’s what happens in a nutshell. A woman is shown in a tattoo parlor watching a Capitals game. As she is being tattooed Ovechkin comes in on net and we hear Joe Beninati calling a goal for the Caps. The tattoo artist pulls back to reveal that she has finished the Caps ‘W’ logo on the woman’s shoulder as the voiceover says “Capitals hockey. The cool alternative”.

Let me be frank. I hate this ad. I do appreciate where it’s coming from: “everyone in D.C. follows the Redskins religiously. Your grandparents watch baseball. The NBA is built on the image of hype and hipness to urban culture. Don’t buy in. Be different. Watch hockey.” But the execution of this ad is laughable.

First of all it feels like obvious pandering. A girl in a dark tattoo shop, with what I assume is supposed to be a badass look on her face, being told outright that hockey is the “cool alternative” (emphasis on the word cool)…it’s all too much and way too obvious what they’re trying to get at. You’re going to have a hard time convincing people who want to different to be different by telling them how to be different.

But the biggest flaw in this ad is that I don’t imagine it making many people who are relatively indifferent become more interested in catching a Caps game, either in person or on television and that of course is the whole goal of advertising. Rather, I think most people who don’t care to much about the Capitals either ignore the ad or roll their eyes at it.

Plus, why is the woman scowling when Beninati calls the goal? Isn’t she supposed to be a Caps fan?

#2 - Guy’s Night Out

This ad obviously makes an effort to appeal to whole “guy’s night out” concept which, again, is a good idea in theory. However the execution again needs some work. We’ve got shots of the guys psyched about their Caps tickets, out to dinner, having a beer, playing some pool and finally arriving at the Verizon Center where they view a Caps win. Again, maybe a decent plan but bad execution. The jerky camera, fast cut scenes and obvious references to ‘chicks’ and beer don’t come across as fun as exciting but rather as comical (you can almost here the guys repetedly calling one another ‘Dude’), and is capped by the guy who’s rubbing his hands together in glee and anticipation upon sighting the Capitals tickets.

But to me, the biggest problem with this ad is how reminiscent it is of the Chappelle’s Show sketch ‘Dude’s Night Out’ featuring the imaginary Schlipps beer. It might not seem a problem at first but consider this: the target for the Capitals ad is clearly young men and many (most?) young men are familiar with Chappelle’s Show, especially the more popular sketches like ‘Dude’s Night Out’. The association popped into my head immediately the first time I saw the Caps ad (and I’m not a huge Chappelle’s Show fan or anything); now every time it airs I just laugh at the absurdity of how closely it resembles ‘Dude’s Night Out’. And truthfully, it makes me want to rent Chappelle’s Show more than go to a Capitals game when I’m watching by myself and makes me embarrassed to be a Caps fan when I’m watching with family or friends who aren’t.

Please note that the second video, ‘Dude’s Night Out’ from Chappelle’s Show may be not safe for work (NSFW) in many places.

Please also note that, to the Caps credit, this ad has been updated to feature the new uniforms and logo.

#3 - Captain Clark

The third Capitals ad I’ve seen aired so far this season features captain Chris Clark talking about the injuries he has suffered, his toughness and what it means to be a leader. Again, let me be frank. I love this ad and it’s clearly the best of the lot from this year. The appeal is fairly simple as the ad focuses on Clark’s dedication to his teammates, to the organization and to the game of hockey. Aside from being appealing to Capitals fans, most of whom would be happy to see Clark’s toughness recognized, this commercial is also the most likely to interest casual fans and get them to come out and see a game.

The Capitals still have a ways to go with their marketing campaign. From what I observed while in the D.C. area, and what I’m told by others, the Capitals don’t advertise much except for during telecasts of their own games which obviously hurts their odds of acquiring new fans. In addition the omission of ads featuring Kolzig (for his loyalty to the organization and achievement, including a Vezina), Semin (for his ability to make highlight reels plays) and Ovechkin (for…well, obvious reasons) is something that ought to be addressed. But at least the spot with Clark is a step in the right direction.

Anyone who’s been paying attention to the sports landscape in the United States can tell you that hockey has a tenuous hold on the title “major sport”. In reality the NHL is not on the same level in terms of revenues, relevance or attention as the NFL, NBA or Major League Baseball and understandably the league has been working to change this. The three issues the league has primarily focused on when trying to increase its fan base have been: parity, scoring and fighting.

The league has worked to increase parity under the belief that fans will better support a team that has a better chance of winning every night, increase scoring because of a belief that games with more goals are more exciting to fans (and as a reaction to the incredibly low scoring games that were all too common in the early 2000’s) and decrease fighting under the belief that the NHL’s reputation as a league of violence was turning away casual fans.

So what actually determines interest (and hence attendance) in hockey? This was the question Rodney J. Paul attempted to answer in this paper, published in April 2003 in The American Journal of Economics and Sociology.

Winning and Parity

Not surprisingly Dr. Paul found that teams that tend to perform better on the ice in terms of standings points tend to draw bigger crowds, all else being equal. Specifically an average of one more point per game raises the attendance by 1021.809 fans per game, and by 1426.866 fans per game in the United States. Now, obviously one more point per game is an enormous difference in success. The best teams in the NHL in the 2006-07 season (Buffalo and Detroit) averaged 1.37 points per game while the worst averaged (Philadelphia) averaged 0.68, so the effect is not as large as might be expected. However, previous season’s points (one additional point from the previous season means 120 more fans per game for U.S. teams, all else being equal) and playoff success (reaching the second round of the playoffs or further) were also statistically significant. Given this it seems pretty clear than more successful teams draw bigger crowds. Not shocking, I know. But since team success has significant impact on attendance and the NHL wants all of its franchises to be financially healthy it makes economic sense to increase parity, and especially to do so by the means of a salary cap.

Scoring

The league has been adamant in its insistence that fans want to see more scoring. This insistence has been the impetus behind a number of changes in recent years: not allowing goalies to play the puck in the corners, calling hooking and holding penalties when there is even intent to hook or hold, decreasing the size of goalie equipment, making a team that has iced the puck keep its players on the ice for the next faceoff and calling delay of game any time a player puts the puck out of play while in their own end. Given how loudly NHL head office officials insist fans want to see scoring Dr. Paul’s finding are surprising: if all else is equal, the number of goals per game a team scores actually lowers average attendance (this coefficient was also statistically significant). On the other hand, visitors with higher per-game averages in terms of goals scored did draw bigger crowds. I would attribute this to fans desire to see marquee players, who are general offensive talents, a variable Dr. Paul did not control for. At best, the jury is out on this one, which makes you wonder why the league is so concerned with upping scoring.

Fighting

Do the fans really like fighting? That’s a question that been posed in a number of different forms for years now and the overwhelming statistical evidence says ‘yes’.

According to Dr. Paul’s paper an increase of one fight per game will raise per-game attendance by 3859.880 fans; 4686.510 fans for U.S. teams, all else being equal. As with points per game a difference of one fight per game would be huge - the Anaheim (Fightin’) Ducks led the NHL with 0.87 fights per game last year and the Detroit Red Wings had the fewest with 0.12 per game. So while in increase in fights of one per game is unlikely it’s feasible that a team could see a 20% increase in their fighting majors which would result in 937 more fans per game (in the U.S.) (note: Detroit is playing to 88.8% capacity this season; Anaheim is playing to 107% capacity).

I’m not a hockey fight advocate nut and don’t want to see bench clearers, the league averaging six fights a game or line brawls on a regular basis. It already irks me when people have the notion that hockey is just constant fighting and just whine about wanting to see a fight when they’re at a game and I want the league to be viewed as the toughest sport in the world, not a spectacle. But I, like most hockey fans I think, do like fighting and think it has a place in the professional game. Like the league’s obsession with increasing scoring it is curious, to say the least, that there has been such a crackdown on fighting when the numbers seem to clearly indicate that it draws more fans.

My theory is that one of two things is going on. One possibility is that the NHL has different data or is getting different results from what is presented in Dr. Paul’s paper. However, I would be pretty surprised if that were the case as it’s unlikely people’s preferences would have changed so drastically in only a few years. What I think is more likely is that the NHL is chasing people who are either casual fans or are not fans of the NHL and in doing so they’re following an opinion that is parroted by so many talking heads with little or no knowledge of the NHL or the game of hockey. It seems like the league is chasing these people and trying to make them into fans which really just isn’t going to happen. This is in large part, I believe, due to the fact the Gary Bettman does not come from a hockey background and thus is predisposed to give these voices more pull than they should have. Sadly I do not have any analytical data for this but my experience has been that when people start talking about what a travesty it is that the NHL has lesser penalties for fighting than other sports, they’re people who wouldn’t watch the NHL anyway (seriously, the next time it happens, ask).

The reality is that fighting, along with exciting games with plenty of scoring chances, draws crowds as long as the fighting doesn’t get out of control. That’s why hockey was booming in the early to mid 90s - the 80s (and early 90s, to me, but maybe that’s because I can’t remember much before then) were great hockey and so people started to sit up and take notice. Now the league is chasing whatever additional attention and revenue it can get in the next six months without thinking about what it can do to make itself the best professional sports league in the world in the long run.

That’s really what it comes down to. The league needs to stop its obsession with month-to-month attendance and dreaming up new gimmicks to try and put a few more people in the seats for a short period of time and instead focus on making the league the most exciting league in the world and marketing it as so. If they’re able to do that concerns over the NHLs popularity and viability should cease.

Forbes just put out an article about the business of hockey and the NHL. On the Caps page they had some harsh words for management:

With a great building and one of the most exciting players in the NHL in Alex Ovechkin, the Washington Capitals could be among the elite franchises in the league instead of one of the worst. The Caps are riddled with incompetent management. General Manager George McPhee has been at the helm for 10 years and has never come close to building a championship caliber team and has gotten the Caps to the playoffs only once during the past five seasons. Glen Hanlon has proven himself to be incapable of coaching at the NHL level. It can not be a surprise to owner Ted Leonsis that his team’s attendance is near the league bottom.

I don’t really know where to begin with how stupid that assessment is. I think most Caps fans know the two things that caused this franchise to crash and burn were the extension to Jagr and the hiring on Bruce Cassidy. I also think most Caps fans are aware that these decisions were made by Leonsis, not McPhee. Now given that Forbes is a financial magazine, not a hockey, magazine so I wouldn’t expected them to necessarily have that depth of knowledge, but if you’re going to make a statement like that you have to be able to back it up by knowing exactly what you’re talking about.

I am have issues with the comment that McPhee “never come close to building a championship caliber team”. In 1998, his first year with the team, they went to the Cup finals (yes I know it was Poile’s team but the way things are laid out in this article…). In 1999-2000 and 2000-01 the team finished first in their division. If you go back to 2001 after Jagr was acquired people were talking about the Caps being one of the Cup contenders. Now obviously it didn’t turn out that way but the team talent was there.

Even if you’re going to say McPhee was riding Polie’s coattails (which I think is a defensible position) then the accurate statement would be “after initially continuing his predecessor’s success McPhee saw his team fall victim to the consequences of an over-involved owner. Since that debacle McPhee has been rebuilding from and bottom up, beginning in an unstable economic environment, and has been unable to turn the Capitals into a playoff team in two seasons”. Oh, the ineptitude! How could this man who has had two entire seasons to turn what was only slightly better than an expansion team into a contender and failed to do it still possibly have a job?!

It’s gets even worse with the assessment of Hanlon who has apparently proven himself to be a failure in his two and a half seasons. That’s just stupid. Now, if you’re watching every Caps game this year I’m sure some of Hanlon’s lines have had you scratching your head. But if you look at how he’s handled this team for the vast majority of the time he’s been at the helm I don’t think it’s fair to say he’s “proven himself incapable of coaching at the NHL level” [emphasis mine]. There’s no coach, in the history of the game, who could have made the teams the Caps skated out there during their rebuilding competitive.

I think the crown jewel is the assessment that since the team has Ovechkin they should be one of the league’s best franchises. Ovechkin is in his third year and was regarded as a phenom going into the draft. That means that within the last couple years the Caps had to have been awful to even get him which means the Caps are only a couple years out of being horrible. Hockey’s not the type of sport where one player can turns things around that quickly.

Also they don’t have the right logo for the Capitals on their page. If they can’t get that right I wonder how much research could have gone into this write up.

Interesting article.

For those interested, Washington falls into the following category:

They are what they are: Los Angeles, New Jersey, New York City, Washington. All big metro centers where there’s strong competition for disposable income. Hard to carve out a niche and claim to be No. 1 compared to everything else that’s going on.

My main issue is with Tampa Bay’s classification:

Nice try, but this doesn’t really work: Florida, Phoenix, Tampa Bay. Non-traditional markets that might join the endangered list after attention is diverted from Nashville.

Tampa Bay’s attendance rankings:

2005-2006: 2nd (20,509)
2006-2007: 3rd (19,876)
2007-2008: 6th (19,175)