When did Sponsorship come into Sports?

[Mets82]

Now I know all arenas and pregame and postgame shows have sponsorship now. You know "The postgame show brought to you by...". We are coming to you from the Staples Center or the XL Center.

What I would like to know is when did this trend start because it seems like EVERYTHING lately has a sponsorship of some kind. I could understand it now because of the economy but now it seems like everything has a sponsor. When did this start and why?

 

[SabresRule]

This is just a guess, but I think it may go back to when L.A.'s Fabulous Forum was renamed "Great Western Forum" in 1988.

Another one- when San Francisco changed Candlestick Park to 3Com Park- that may have had a jinxing effect, for the 49ers have not won, let alone reached a Super Bowl since then.

 

[anders5189]

The stadium naming is relatively recent going back to the Forum deal that Sabres mentioned, but sponsors have been around for a while. I saw an old WS game on the MLB Network, Larsen's perfect game in the 56 WS, and they showed some of the orginal ads that Gilette ran during the game. As a kid I remember the Green Monster in Fenway was always just green and thought it was weird when I saw old films that showed the monster covered in ads back in the day. Now? The monster and everything else at Fenway has ads.

 

[SamCdbs]

Stadium names:

Wrigley Field, Busch Stadium, and Crosley Field were all named after the owners in the hope they would sell more gum, beer, or radios respectivly. And that was 70 years ago.

However, the first modern deal I can remember is the Carrier Dome which is back to 1979.

In general:

I think not having a lot of signage sponsorship became a point of pride to US "big 4" leagues about in the early 60s. Made them feel superior to car racing or euro-soccer As player's pay got outrageous into the 80s, then they came back in.

 

[HD MM]

How about this weekend's H-O-R-S-E event during the NBA All-Star weekend? They played G-E-I-C-O instead.

 

[Paul Wozniak]

When? Before I was born.
Why? You all ready know that answer.

 

[HD MM]

When? When the higher ups invented a thing called money.

 

[Ramy]

They have had advertising on outfield walls in baseball since pretty much the beginning.

 

[denisincalif]

They have had advertising on outfield walls in baseball since pretty much the beginning.

Yes, but not everywhere. When Dodger Stadium opened in 1962 there were two prominent towers rising from the parking lot just behind the outfield stands with big orange Union 76 balls on top. They were actually kind of pretty and not at all distracting. No other advertising appeared anywhere---not in the stands, not on facades of each seating level, and most certainly not on the walls in foul or fair territory. All that changed when Peter O'Malley sold the team. Now there is advertising for dozens of products on practically every square inch of vertical space.

 

[SamCdbs]

I think Dodger Stadium is a good marking point.

Prior that that, in the old films, you see the deal with the outfield walls covered in ads and all of that. Dodger Stadium had the classy system, which was followed in different ways by most of the modern stadiums. And then we have today's system.

If you caught the Carribbean Series on MLBN or euro-soccer, you see what is coming.

 

[Kevinw]

The modern era of stadium naming rights in North America may have begun when the Anheuser-Busch company in 1953 proposed re-naming Sportsman's Park, occupied by the St. Louis Cardinals, "Budweiser Stadium". When this idea was rejected by Ford Frick, the Commissioner of Baseball at that time, Anheuser-Busch then proposed the title "Busch Stadium" after one of the company's founders. The name was readily approved and Anheuser-Busch released a product called "Busch Bavarian Beer" (now known as Busch Beer). The name would later be shifted to the Busch Memorial Stadium in 1966, shortened in the 1970s to "Busch Stadium" and remained the stadium's name until it closed in 2005.

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