Faded Glory Top Level Marketing Plan/Business Positioning Statement

Executive Summary

This marketing plan is designed to give the reader a blueprint into Endorphin Entertainment’s sports marketing genre/brand, “Faded Glory.”  Faded Glory is a created brand targeting males/females ages 21 – 60 that still or at one time did participate in some level of organized amateur sports.  The intention is to directly market the Faded Glory brand across a collection of business ventures in the areas of film entertainment, clothing and motivational speaking.

We have included a complete market analysis, target market summaries, a SWOT analysis, and other relevant discussions in support of this branding campaign.  Separate lines of business plans have been created in support of each initiative.

Our ambitions for this marketing plan include:
•    Using our existing relationships with the entertainment industry as well as local and national sports marketing firms to build the “Faded Glory” brand into a documentary film/television entertainment venue, clothing line, and motivational speaking engagement business operation.
•    Creating various lines of business that will draw sponsorships from possible strategic partners. These promotions are critical to our strategy of increasing our strategic alliances through cross-promotions of our business ventures.
•    Identifying our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
•    Identifying the target markets and direct promotional opportunities.
We hope this marketing plan creates a long-term growth model for our various lines of business.

Situation Analysis

Demographics for amateur sports in the United States have exploded upwards over the past 10 years.  Generation X and Y and now the “Hipster Dad” generation (i.e. post baby boomer generation Age 35 to 50 with children) grew up around organized sports and as adults still participate in at least one competitive sport.  It is not uncommon for an adult in this age group to be involved in one or more competitive leagues such as baseball, tennis, golf, hockey, basketball, fantasy sports, poker, etc.  In our opinion, as the populous ages, demand for these leagues will only increase, which increases the commercial and creative opportunities to sell products/services around this demographic.

Due to explosion of commercial technology (Internet, TV, Movies), insatiable demand for entertainment “realness”, otherwise known as reality TV, there is an untapped opportunity to blend these two trends into a sports marketing brand based around entertainment, clothing and potentially motivational engagements/products.

Market Summary

In 2007 US National reports, approximately 10% of the US population (30,000,000) participates in some form of organized amateur leagues.  We expect this trend to maintain its strength due to growth in the general population, increases in free leisure time to participate in these activities, increased explosion and coverage of mass media sporting events, the increasing popularity of sport in our culture, and the need for people to maintain or improve overall health and fitness.

Market Penetration

Building of the Faded Glory Brand is a multi-phased distribution approach.  Initially, to reach the intended targeted population, a baseball documentary is planned that will be marketed via non-traditional entertainment distribution channels.  Grass roots marketing program is planned after production of the film, which includes penetration of the targeted market place via DVD Sales to national amateur baseball associations, creation of internet blogging sites and focused relationships with local and national sports marketing firms, and then, based on initial demand, potentially distributing the documentary to other traditional entertainment channels such as film festivals, theatrical box office and TV networks.

We feel this approach is the most cost efficient approach to penetrate this target market.  It maximizes our opportunity to pay back initial investors quickly.  In addition, we feel our chances to differentiate our film product from other documentaries increases significantly from those that utilize high risk traditional film distribution models, which are inherently expensive and have low probability of success.
Target Market

Our three main target markets are the “weekend warriors” sports fanatics, single or young, married (both male and female age 21-40).  We call this demographic the “Hipster Mom and Dad” population.  It represents those who are active but maintain their youthfulness, and the fringe or curious population who are not necessarily active participants of amateur sports, but know people that do.  Both groups support those types of activities and have a great interest in sports.  We predict that the number of “Hipster Mom and Dad” sectors will increase at a faster rate then the curious, but that the “weekend warrior” sports fanatics will be the core target market.
Marketing Needs

There are two important underlying needs: 1) people will continue to participate in amateur sports due to health and competitive reasons, and 2) the continued explosion of internet, television and media coverage that has seemingly increased sports exposure and personal notoriety to those who participate.  “Faded Glory” is about taking those needs/trends and building a sports marketing brand though a series of entertainment and retail businesses.

1.    There is a real need for people to be entertained and connected with each other in the form of “reality” entertainment.  While traditional blockbuster big film movies and TV series are losing their luster due to their non-reality fiction genre, smaller documentary movies, smaller reality television segments, and other internet media channels are gaining market share inside of the entertainment industry.  There is a fundamental shift in how entertainment is being delivered to the viewing public, which is pushing entertainment distribution entities to revise their distribution models and begin to deliver content/story lines via “real-life” examinations of the character’s lives versus traditional script writing.

2.    There is a practical need for a sports clothing line that emits an emotional response from those participating in amateur leagues.  Similar to the massive success of multi-billion dollar businesses marketing collegiate and professional athletic team gear and clothing, in our opinion the amateur market is the next logical step for new growth markets.  Currently, the amateur clothing line is extremely immature due to a fragmented market and the lack of a national amateur sports brand. 

Marketing Trends

Trends are in our favor. We have three major trends that help us:
•    Participation in amateur sporting leagues is clearly growing both at a local and national level across all sport.
•    Population is aging and more people have free leisure time to invest their time and energies into amateur sport.
•    Competing, and the quest to do you very best, is a fabric of the American culture.  Attention to sports and sports related content and products is growing exponentially via the internet, television, print advertising and commercial retail sectors.
Marketing Growth
•    According to [the latest available studies], national spending on amateur sports and sports products and services will grow faster then the current rate of inflation, approaching 10% per year on-top of an already multi-billion commercial market.
•    Growth in amateur leagues, specifically amateur baseball, is growing 6-8% per year.  We expect that growth to continue in the foreseeable future.

SWOT Analysis – Faded Glory Baseball Documentary

Endorphin Entertainment, Faded Glory film development company, recognizes the following strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) of its documentary project Faded Glory.
Strengths:
•    National and community interest in the baseball genre. 
•    Experience in entertainment industry and relationships with local sports marketing executives.
•    Direct marketing access to approximately 100,000 amateur baseball enthusiasts.
Weaknesses:
•    Limited capital investment.
•    Limited experience dealing with distribution companies as part of a phase 2 distribution roll-out of the “Faded Glory” documentary.
Opportunities:
•    There is no well known, well-focused, well-marketed competition within the baseball documentary film genre.  Virtually all documentaries follow this traditional distribution model.
•    The cost of Internet and other direct marketing opportunities have decreased in recent years.  Creating a gorilla marketing campaign is now easier due to internet blogging opportunities, DVD mass mailings and national media exposure from the likes of ESPN, Fox Sports Net and other independents (Spike, Versus, FX) looking for reality sports content.
•    Creating production content requires less capital investment and the time to market is more accelerated then traditional full feature films.
Threats:
•    The film industry is very competitive and well known for projects never making a profit for their initial investors or distribution companies.  Quality projects are sometimes never taken to market due to lack of market appeal, changing audience tastes, or lack of industry seasoned executive project sponsorship.

Strengths

Our most significant strength lies in our management team's skills in the creative and financial operations of the project.  After working many years in the Hollywood circuit, Rick Cohen, producer/writer has gained significant experience in production and distribution of television and film projects.  In addition, Chris Pullaro has worked a number of years with small business clients looking for direction and strategic cohesion on various start-up projects. His experience in start-up operations, contract negotiation and business development will assist in this project.

Weaknesses

The Endorphin Entertainment team has access to a limited amount of investment capital.  $29,000 of seed capital has been raised and only 30% of the project has already been shot.  Additional capital investment will be required to complete the remaining production/editing.

Nobody at Endorphin Entertainment has significant experience in mass marketing a baseball documentary to the public.  This is the reason Endorphin Entertainment is looking to partner with a local sports marketing firm that has the same target audience as the documentary film, and who will be willing to mass market the film to the intended audience for a share of company equity.

Opportunities

The market for documentaries is the fastest growing sector of the film industry, and the sports sub-category is growing at 30% per year.   To date, no one has created a baseball documentary marketed to amateur baseball enthusiasts.

The cost to produce and market a baseball documentary is less then 10% of the average feature film.  In addition, with the growth of internet blogging, video viewing and posting sites such as You Tube, Keneva and other video staging areas, creating an initial viewing distribution channel at low cost has a tremendous risk/return ratio.  In addition, leveraging our relationships with management of the largest amateur baseball leagues, (the NABA and the MABL/MSBL) we have an initial imbedded market of approximately 100,000 amateur baseball players.  By marketing the documentary to these leagues and their player lists via DVD sales, the leagues gain free exposure to their service and increase their chances for higher participation rates while increasing the brand awareness of “Faded Glory.”

Threats

The film production/distribution business is a high risk/high return business model.  The film industry is a highly competitive business with many films shelved due to change in consumer tastes or the lack of executive project sponsorship.  To succeed, management will have to develop strong relationships with key executives of the sports marketing and entertainment industries to increase chances for success.

Success Factors

To succeed in this venture we must:
•    Creativity - Create a film that resonates with the audience at a character and reality level. We must offer a viewing experience that is rich in character development and storyline, and that entertains and addresses the real life issues of the players filmed.
•    Sports Marketing – We must develop partnership arrangements with local based sports marketing firms that can efficiently penetrate local sports markets and help market the Faded Glory documentary and brand.
•    To partner with the appropriate technology service companies to help assist in building a smart internet strategy in support of marketing the documentary. 
•    Establish relationships with the management teams of all major amateur baseball associations to leverage their lists and create an immediate demand for the documentary.
Marketing Strategy
•    We will build strategic partnerships with local sport marketing firms.
•    We will differentiate Faded Glory from other documentary projects through the use of non-traditional distribution channels and the implementation of local and national marketing campaigns.
•    We will leverage existing Internet technologies to immediately create internet buzz around the documentary.