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Pros take the field in Chicago and Northwest Indiana.
Ticket information
Chicago Cubs www.chicago.cub.mlb.com
Chicago White Sox www.chicago.whitesox.mlb.com
South Bend Silver Hawks 574/235-9988 www.silverhawks.com
Gary RailCats 219/882-2255 www.railcatsbaseball.com
Chicago baseball is smiling. The season has just begun and both the Cubs and White Sox are in the thick of a pennant race. It's a long season and success won't be known until September, but for now, there is plenty to cheer about.
Chicago is one of those rare baseball cities where loyalties are split between two teams – the Cubs of the National League on the north side and the American League White Sox on the south side.
The popularity of the two teams is indisputable. Last year, the Cubs drew 3.1 million fans to Wrigley Field, an average of 39,610 a game; the White Sox attracted 2.2 million fans to U.S. Cellular Field, an average of 28,179 a game.
So how can you tell fan loyalty? Simple. Cubs fans proudly wear red and blue while White Sox fans are dressed in black and white. And team colors are everywhere – on flags flying at the front door of homes, on bumper stickers, or on hats and T-shirts.
It's that way in Northwest Indiana, too. Without a major league team in Indiana to call their own, the colors of both Chicago teams are scattered throughout the region, making it a fertile area for both the Cubs and White Sox to market players and a family-friendly atmosphere at the ball park.
The Cubs open 2010 with a new enthusiasm, thanks to new owners who have pledged to field a championship-caliber team. And if the Cubs were to win a World Series, it would be the team's first since 1908.
The Ricketts family (whose fortune came from the discount stock brokerage company TD Ameritrade Holding Corp.) spent $845 million to buy the Cubs last year. They have promised not only a competitive team but improvements to landmark Wrigley Field, home of the Cubs since 1913. The franchise, which began play in 1876, won World Series championships in 1907 and 1908.
On the south side, the White Sox have been around since 1900 and won a World Series in 2005, the team's first since 1906, when it defeated the Cubs in the only all-Chicago World Series. Since 1981, the team has been owned by Jerry Reinsdorf, who led the effort to replace aging Comiskey Park in 1991 with a new stadium, which is known as U.S. Cellular Field.
Wally Hayward, executive vice president and chief sales and marketing officer for the Cubs, says that even though the team remains hugely popular among its diehard faithful, that doesn't mean the Cubs can ease off its marketing efforts in Chicago and Northwest Indiana.
“Northwest Indiana is important to us,” says Hayward. “We've been out there in Northwest Indiana for more than 25 years, visiting schools and organizations.” This past winter, as part of the annual Cubs Caravan, players, coaches and front office staff visited the Boys & Girls Club in Gary. In 2009, the Cubs Caravan visited Valparaiso High School, the alma mater of Cubs's pitcher Jeff Samardzija, who was a standout three-sport athlete there.
Hayward says the team has developed an advertising strategy with region newspapers and routinely donates Cubs merchandise and autographed items to local charities for their fund-raising auctions.
“Definitely it helps us to market the team when you have a player like Jeff (Samardzija) who is from the area,” says Hayward. “This is an effort for us to leverage Jeff and the Cubs.”
At 41,160-seat Wrigley field, Hayward says about 2 percent of the season ticket packages sold by the Cubs are in the hands of Northwest Indiana families and businesses.
Outside of Chicago proper, Hayward says the team has pockets of loyal fans from Rockford north of the city, to Kankakee in the south to Michigan City in the east. “We look at those pockets and try to reach out to fans there,” says Hayward. “We're looking at all areas where our fan base is located.”
For Brooks Boyer, vice president and chief marketing officer for the White Sox, Northwest Indiana is the team's back yard.
“Northwest Indiana is a very important demographic for us,” says Boyer, whose Northwest Indiana roots go back to his days as a member of the University of Notre Dame men's basketball team from 1990 to 1994.
“The access to the ballpark from there is so easy,” says Boyer. U.S. Cellular Field sits along the Dan Ryan Expressway, one of the busiest traffic corridors in the city.
Along with major television and radio buys in Chicago (which covers all of Northwest Indiana), Boyer says the White Sox have purchased video boards and newspaper ads throughout the region.
And, says Boyer, the Sox are trying to lure young Northwest Indiana fans through the Bulls/Sox Academy. White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf also owns the Chicago Bulls NBA franchise.
“We have 6-year-olds to elite players coming in to the academy where we teach them how to play the game,” says Boyer. Sox coaches and players are involved at the academy, which in Northwest Indiana is based at Omni 41 in Schererville.
“We also have a significant number of groups and schools from Northwest Indiana coming to games,” says Boyer.
While there are a sizable number of Northwest Indiana season ticket holders at 40,616-seat U.S. Cellular Field, Boyer declined to provide specific stats.
As with every other Major League Baseball team, Boyer says the goal of the White Sox is to provide a fun and memorable experience for visitors.
“We're in competition not only with the Cubs, but with every other form of entertainment from the movie theater to the mall,” says Boyer. “We're kidding ourselves if we say we don't compete with other forms of entertainment.”
At the end of the day, Boyer says the White Sox want fans to feel they're a part of the organization. ”
Boyer says the White Sox's marketing effort is designed to draw as many fans as possible from all regions of the Chicago area.
“We want to maximize our ability to draw from across the area,” says Boyer, adding that outside of Chicago proper, the major areas targeted by the White Sox are the western suburbs, Northwest Indiana and the south suburbs.
“They're all very important to us,” says Boyer.
Baseball in Northwest Indiana
The same song is being sung by Northwest Indiana's two minor league baseball teams, the South Bend Silver Hawks and the Gary SouthShore RailCats.
Amy Hill, the director of marketing and community partnerships for the Silver Hawks, says the team is marking its 25th anniversary this year with the theme “Your Town, Your Team.” She says the team is also marking 150 years of baseball in the city.
The Silver Hawks are a Class A minor league affiliate of the Arizona Diamondbacks, and play in the 14-team Midwest League.
Hill says the team has always been involved in the community, but this year has partnered with schools in an effort to boost reading among children.
“We're in our second year of Swoop's Reading Club,” Hill says of the team's ever-present mascot. “We have 14,000 kids involved this year. We're getting out into the classroom and Swoop is making appearances.” Hill says it's all part of the team's effort to drum up support for the Silver Hawks within a 60-mile radius of South Bend.
In addition to Swoop's Reading Club, Swoop also makes appearances at parades throughout the Michiana area. At 5,000-seat Coveleski Stadium at the edge of downtown, Hill says efforts are under way to improve lighting and restrooms and install new netting to protect fans behind home plate.
Single game tickets are $6 for bleacher seats; $8 for box seats; and packages for six to 20 games range from $30 to $130. Hill says the team also hosts $1 Monday games and Two for Tuesdays along with souvenir Saturday games.
Dave Salvi, manager of advertising and promotions for the RailCats, says he believes the best way to promote the team is to put a quality product on the field. The team lost in the championship of last year's Frontier League.
Salvi says it's important for the 6,000-seat U.S. Steelyard to be known as a “fun, family friendly place.” That's why, he says, the team holds regular fireworks events, giveaways on Saturday and community nights throughout the season.
“Those kind of niche things are important,” says Salvi.
One of the big events last year was Blackhawks Night, where players from the National Hockey League's Chicago Blackhawks attended and signed autographs. Salvi hopes to repeat that this year, and also has a Chicago Bears night planned.
“We're also going to have a Star Wars night,” says Salvi. “We just signed an agreement for Peter Mayhew, the actor who played Chewbacca in the Star Wars movies, to make an appearance. We also want to do something around Michael Jackson's birthday, too.”
The RailCats have an exhibition game May 12 against the Valparaiso University Crusaders and open the season at home May 20 against the Kansas City T-Bones. Gary plays in the seven-team independent Frontier League.
Salvi says that even though Gary sits in the shadow of the Chicago market, the RailCats have plenty of opportunities. “People take a lot of pride in this community,” says Salvi. “People who live in Northwest Indiana are proud of where they live and we want to be a part of that.”
Salvi says he promotes the team through traditional newspaper and radio advertising, but also through such social media as Twitter and Facebook. Rusty, the team's mascot, has his own Facebook page, for instance.
“We plan to very aggressively promote the team through social media to get our message out,” says Salvi.
Tickets for RailCats games are $10 and packages for nine and 10 games are available starting at $72.
