The NHL is doing anything it can to increase revenue after the financial hit they took from the COVID-19 pandemic. Last season they added corporate logos to the players’ helmets. Now, corporate logos will be added to the players’ jersey as well. That means besides the Chase logo on New York Rangers helmets there will be another logo, adding to the marketing clutter.
As reported by Sportico, the logos will be small, a rectangle three inches by three and a half inches. Where they will be located on the uniform remains to be seen, but it will have to be in a highly visible place.
When it comes to revenue, it’s not petty cash for NHL teams. According to the NHL, the helmet logo deal resulted in $100 million in additional revenue for the teams. The uniform patches should be worth more. The NBA took in $150 million from their patch deal on uniforms. For a team like the Rangers, with high television viewership and a national profile, that revenue can be worth over $10 million.
So, who are the candidates to get their logo emblazoned on Adam Fox’s chest? The Knicks sponsor is Squarespace, though the idea of a company named Squarespace in a rectangle is a bit counterintuitive.
Here’s who was on the boards or the ice at Madison Square Garden at the end of this season:
- Honda
- Chase
- Mass Mutual
- Bud Light
- Geico
- Jagermeister
- Spectrum
- Dunkin’ Donuts
- Clorox
- Delta
- Guaranteed Rates
- Northwell Health
- 5G
- Discover
- Pepsi Zero Sugar
- Enterprise
- Kia
- Empire City Casino
- Gatorade
That’s a lot of sponsorships and how much Clorox has to do with ice hockey is a question. There’s also a question of whether the NHL will allow alcohol or gambling logos on uniforms.
Hey, maybe the team can sell logos according to ice time? Artemi Panarin could sport a Tiffany’s logo while Julien Gauthier could wear one for G&A Gourmet Deli. What would the Haymaker Bar pay to have their logo on Ryan Reaves? What about Finnair on Kaapo Kakko? CityMD for Ryan Lindgren? NYC Ferry for Barclay Goodrow? We’d suggest a Target logo for Tom Wilson just for opening night.
The goal
All kidding aside, does anyone think it is the end of the world to add a small logo to the uniform jersey? While we don’t want NHL players to look like walking billboards as they do in Europe, if it means even a slight increase in the salary cap, it should be worth it.
Earlier this month, Frank Seravelli of the Daily Faceoff reported that the cap will go up by $1 million in 2022-23. The projection is that after three seasons stuck at $81.5 million, the cap will increase by $1 million a year through 2025-26 with the first sizeable increase in 2026-27 to as much as $91.4 million.
It’s all related to the escrow balance owed by the players to the owners as part of their partnership agreement from the last Collective Bargaining Agreement. Simply put, when the players’ share of the revenue is exceeded by their total salary number, they owe the owners the difference and as salaries continue to grow, the escrow number doesn’t shrink.
What it means is we are looking at a maximum cap ceiling of $85.5 million in the 2025-26 season and that is no help to the Rangers who will be looking to sign their young stars for the long term well before the cap is scheduled to increase substantially.
So, if adding logos helps get the salary cap to increase, pile ’em on. After all, the ONLY people who called it the MassMutual NHL® East Division were the announcers on NBC.
Does all that signage on the boards really bother anyone? Does anyone reading this remember that there were TEN corporate logos actually on the ice surface at Madison Square Garden last season?
It’s all about having the cash to pay to keep a core of young stars together. Without it, the team will have to unload players we want to keep and who want to stay in New York. Ask Pavel Buchnevich about that.