VEGAS INC Magazine - Latest Las Vegas business news, features and commentaries about gaming, tourism, real estate and more
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/47497
COVER STORY CAMPING IT UP: The Wranglers' Oct. 21 Rapture Night promotion featured T-shirts making light of Christian broadcaster Harold Camping's doomsday prediction. COLD SHOT: Rapture Night was a far cry from the end of the world for Ryan Weston (shown here) and the Wranglers. They beat Ontario, 4-1. POSTSEASON CROWD: The Wranglers have made the ECHL playoffs for six straight seasons. This photo is from the 2009-10 first round. BANNER MOMENT: From leſt to right: Las Vegas Wranglers players Judd Blackwater (23), Barry Goers (6), and Eric Lampe (7) stood during the national anthem at Orleans Arena, the team's home venue, before a recent game. MOB SCENE: Wranglers players crowded around Eric Lampe to celebrate his game-winning power play goal Oct. 29 against the Bakersfield Condors. audience you wouldn't otherwise talk to," Swangard said. "It's like having sports figures on 'Dancing With the Stars' — you're in front of a whole different group of people. It's savvy public relations, more than anything else. They've found a formula that gets the locals to pay attention from the media side." TWEAKING THE MODEL The Wranglers compete in the biggest market of the 20 teams in the ECHL (formerly the East Coast Hockey League, before it expanded West), which is comparable to a Double-A league in baseball. Although the ECHL sends a handful of players to the National Hockey League | 14 NOVEMBER 2011 | every year, it's safe to say casual fans won't recognize the names on the rosters. The ECHL's teams, which stretch from Alaska to Florida, have averaged 3,900 fans per game this season. Las Vegas' attendance has been just below the league average at Orleans Arena, which seats 7,773 when configured for hockey. The team is owned by San Diego businessman Gary Jacobs, managing director of Jacobs Investment Co. and son of Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs. Johnson's marketing strategy is no revelation to the Wranglers' few thousand regular fans. They've seen the high-concept promotions, which Johnson intersperses with traditional minor-league attractions and events with a Vegas twist — like midnight games and performances by a Billy Idol impersonator and Minikiss, a Kiss tribute band made up of dwarfs. But what others might not know about Johnson is that for all the circuslike qualities of his marketing, his approach is based on sound marketing principles. It's true. A guy who got his start in the sports business as a mascot for a minor-league baseball team and who calls "The Gong Show" creator and host Chuck Barris his hero has legitimate lessons to offer other businesses about promotions and public relations. Jack Schibrowsky, a longtime marketing professor at UNLV, credited Johnson for recognizing that the traditional minor-league marketing model wouldn't 17