Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

dJ@UUD~[f)@[f{]~ Tony Dimitriades Brand Development; New Technologies and E-Commerce; Merchandising and Entertainment Industry Liason JamSports is the promoter that AMA Pro Racing has chosen to replace CJear Channel. The private company's point person on this project will be Tony Dimitriades, who has also promoted singer Tom Petty for more than 25 years. Dimitriades responded bye-mail to our e-mailed questions on Sunday, November 1l. How and when did JaroSports and AMA Pro Racing first enter into negotiations? Two of the principals of JamSports, Donnie Graves and Mike Held, through their Motor Racing connections, heard that the AMA was considering proposals from several different parties. This was around the end of May [2001]. We then contacted the AMA and asked if we also could make a presentation. annually. In the first six months of 200 I, Jam ranked third in number of tickets sold behind Clear Channel and HOB. In the Midwest, Jam probably ranks second only to Clear Channel in the number of concerts promoted annually. Jam refused to sell to SFX, and is the largest company not to do so. We have no record of percentages but would add that Jam principals also manage performers who have performed in the biggest venues in every state and have settled shows in buildings and stadiums in virtually every state and on every continent. Cutting to the chase, we are very capable of doing the job; don't let anyone teU you otherwise. The AMA press release states that Jam Productions is "the largest independent producer of live events in North America." Could you please explain this statement in more detail? Pollstar is the industry trade publication which lists the events promoted and the relevant numbers (attendance, gross dollar sales, etc.). For the first six months of 2001, Jam Productions was listed as third overall in the promoter category, which uses attendance as the criteria. The first two promoters. Clear Channel and House of Blues, are not, like Jam, independently owned and financed companies. The AMA press release mentions "JamSports principals' extensive contacts in the music, television and motorsports areas..... What experience does JamSports have in motorsports? Has JamSports ever produced a live motorsports event? Jam has not produced a supercross event but has produced, promoted and marketed (in addition to concerts, theatrical presentations and special events) a wide variety of events, including live and closed-circuit boxing matches, tennis toumaments, ice shows, gymnastic shows, professional football games, circuses, ballet, etc. Jam principals have owned racing teams and manage drivers. Jam's sponsorship clients include several I.arge Fortune 500 corporations, and some we represent exclusively in motorsports sponsorship. Of the live-event market in North America, what percentage would you say Jam Productions promotes? Jam has promoted its events in 22 states over the past 30 years. Before the consolidation of the concert industry by SFX, Jam was annually one of the top five grossing companies in the country. On average, Jam promotes 1000 events What challenges do you foresee with producing supercross? Trying to be the best at what you do is itself a challenge. We are always challenging ourselves to be better than everyone else. More specifically, the challenges are many, and new ones will constantly emerge. Bruce Stjernstrom Director of Professional Racing When did you hear about the decision? Actually, Scott Hollingsworth and John Farris [of AMA Pro Racing] called me on Monday night and gave me kind of an outline of what they had decided and what their plans were nothing in great detail. Then yesterday [Tuesday], I got the press-release information. I guess in some sense, I'm not sur· prised, but I have a little trepidation about the whole thing. Were you surprised by the timing? No. Actually, that might be the best part of it - that rather than kind of waiting until the 11 th hour, which has been kind of the M.O. of our sport, at least some decision has been made. I don't know what the result is going to be of all this; it's probably one of the biggest things that's happened in motocross in a long time. What is Kawasaki's position on it? Right now, I'm not sure we really have one, because I don't think all the information is there where we can really make any kind of decision. Obviously, we're concerned about schedules and venues, and things like that. Press releases are really easy to write, but the responsibilities are the part that you always have to kind of weigh: How is this all going to happen? That's always a concern that you have. One of the things, from our team's position, is the sport has come up to a pretty high level recently, and I think that the guys at Clear Channel have been primarily responsible for that - and brought up the National series with it, as well. They've improved some of the standards that they've set. Those kinds of things, you have to have respect for that part What can JamSports bring to the sport of supercross that other promoters haven't? While JamSports' affiliation with Jam Productions ensures we have the experience to promote and market any type of event, including supercross, it is important to understand that JamSports is not just a promotion company. The principals have huge and diverse experience in dealing with and managing talent (drivers, artists, production designers, etc.). We have worked as partners with some of the biggest names in entertainment and motorsports, have owned racing teams and have even raced motorcross [sic] as an AMA shop-sponsored rider. We can, therefore, approach production, marketing and promotion issues from a whole other perspective. As such, we have challenged promoters on the deal, the marketing, the esthetics and every other possible thing imaginable, from the M&Ms in the dressing room to the price of the tickets. We care about the long term, and we care about everyone who contributes. We want the riders to be huge stars and the manufacturers to sell motorbikes. We want everyone's sponsors to be happy, and we want the fans to get value for their money. We are not a public company; every principal is an owner and will not be subjected to the pressure of delivering quarterly forecasts to a head office, which may force corners to be cut and contributors to be cut out. We want all contributors to be participants, and vice versa. We respect the heritage of the AMA and of supercross, and we will do our utmost to justify their confidence in us. We care what you guys in the press think of us, but not enough to compromise our integrity by telling you something just because we think it's what you want to hear. As for what other promoters have or haven't done, we can't really comment. We can only speak about ourselves. sion now, is how we're going to deal with it. That's the most difficult part, is where do we take this from here? The manufacturers have contributed a lot of money and support to these programs as well - all the manufacturers - so does it diminish our investment? f%@l5!l@~@DJD f1!jJ@)J@rn;s With Ricky Carmichael, Team Chevy Trucks Kawasaki won the championship in this year's EA Sports Supercross Series. Kawasaki employee John Hoover sits on the AMA Board of Trustees. We spoke by telephone with Kawasaki Motors Corp. Director of Professional Racing by telephone on Wednesday, November 7. For now, in no particular order, we can think of the following: 1. To win the trust of the manufacturers and riders so that, with their participation, and with that of the AMA, we can grow the sport commercially and esthetically to its utmost potential. 2. To create a first-class TV production that does justice to the live spectacle, attracts sponsors, and appeals to and attracts many new viewers from outside the current demographic. 3. To ensure all participants benefit from growth in a fair way. 4. To find' new ways to increase spectator enjoyment while not changing the integrity of the sport. of it. I spent 10 years of my life trying to run events, and I know how difficult it is. Probably me more than anybody respects what they've brought to the table, which is a very orderly and friendly program for the fans, the TV, the media which didn't exist before. Those are the kinds of things that concern me - that that continues to be in place. I'm sure that's all part of the equation, but seeing is believing. If it came down to there being two series, how would Kawasaki form its decision as to which it would campaign? There will be a lot of discussion about it here. We want to race, and that's why we do all this stuff. We want to race against the best that's there. The potential [is there] for one of the biggest fallouts of the sport; it's what's happened with [open-wheel automobile-racing series] CART and IRL, which has been disastrous. One of my good friends, [former Kawasaki Team Green managerl Mark Johnson, who is now a general manager of the Rahal Team, I just talked to him the other day - not about this business, but just about what's happened with CART and IRL. There's just nothing good about it for either side, even though you can say, 'Well, this side seems to be making progress,' or whatever. But if you want to say for open-wheel car racing in America, it hasn't been a good thing. An aggressive fight between two titans in motocross - it just doesn't seem like the outcome could be that good for the sport. It's hard for me to envision how that could benefit the sport. If you want to capsulize what my biggest concern is, it's that, because it is at a pretty good level right now. People are critical of everything, saying, 'This could better, and this could be better,' but if you weigh the whole program, it's really pretty good. You've got to consider that in motorcycle racing, which is never really going to approach automobile racing, for a lot of reasons, that we're living pretty good right now in supercross and motocross. Maybe the timing of this whole thing is not that great, I don't know, but that wasn't our decision. And that's our deci- Those manufacturers have tended to go with the AMA in the past. Will that happen again? I don't think anybody can draw that conclusion at this point, until there's more facts that come out, like what kind of series they're going to be, when the series are conducted, the venues, and the standard of rules - all of the things that go along with it. I think that we'd be assuming a lot, [to think] that that's going to be alike. Maybe the series will take on different personalities than they [have] right now, because that's what people try to do - differentiate themselves from each other. We don't know how that's going to play out at this point. It's great media fodder right now, this whole thing, but if we really look into the future at what could happen - man, it's hard for me to believe that a prolonged fight is going to be a good thing for anybody: for the fans, for the riders, for the teams, for the manufacturers, for the aftermarket companies that are involved. It just seems like people are pouring an awful lot of resource into this thing, but we'll see. I think it's going to play out in a certain direction, but it's just too early to tell right now. I don't think people should get alarmed about it or anything like that, because we don't know really what's going to happen between now and then. I would like to credit people in our sport for being intelligent enough to make decisions so things can come to some kind of reasonable conclusion. Will the manufacturers get together to discuss this situation? I don't think ~o. I think you'll see each company look at it individually and see what makes sense for them. They may look at what the other companies are doing, and say, 'Well, that makes sense.' or, 'That doesn't make sense,' but it might not be even legal [for the manufacturers to meet]. Could a manufacturer put together two factory teams to contest a pair of series? That seems a bit unlikely at this point. The timing would allow something like that, if... any of the teams decided to do something like that. The normal plan is that it would be happening two months from now. Now we've got 14 months, so that's a unique feature in itself. But it's hard to imagine that scenario. cue I e n e _ s NOVEMBER 21, 2001 11

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