Gallery drops bowl game, but eyes other sponsorships
By Brian Carroll -- Furniture Today, February 10, 2002
Houston — After two years as sponsor of the galleryfurniture.com college football bowl game, Gallery Furniture here is pulling out. But it's not about to disappear from the Houston sports scene.
Unwilling to bump up his financial commitment to the level the bowl's directors want, Gallery's Jim McIngvale is turning his attentions to pro baseball and women's tennis.
"I'm out of the bowl business, but it was a good two years for us," said McIngvale, president of single-store Gallery, which ranks No. 56 on Furniture/Today's Top 100 furniture stores. "It was good local marketing, but without multiple stores across the country, it didn't make much sense to keep doing it."
After a payout of $750,000, which required about $400,000 from Gallery, the bowl's organizers hope to bump up to $1.5 million per team. The jump will require between $2 million and $3 million from the bowl's title sponsor.
The bowl wasn't the first foray into sports by Gallery, which has sponsored rodeos, pro basketball and pro tennis. And McIngvale and his wife, Linda, own the Westside Tennis Club, which hosts the U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships, as well as a practice facility for the Houston Rockets.
Next on McIngvale's list? Pro baseball's Enron Field, perhaps, and a bid for a Women's Tennis Assn. event.
"Houston is a great place for women's tennis and the sport is a great demographic for furniture," he said. "We'll bring them down (to the Clay Court Championships) this year to show them what a quality event we put on and look for an event in '03."
Enron Field is a possibility, but the Houston Astros are in a holding pattern because the bankrupt Enron has paid for its stadium naming rights through July. If and when the Astros drop the name of the troubled corporation from their playing venue, McIngvale said he's interested in talking.
"The Astros certainly want (Enron's) name off the field," he said. "It's a little like O.J. Field right now. If they do that, I'll talk to them."
Since Sept. 11, the sports world and the world of sponsorships has changed, McIngvale said. He doesn't expect it will be difficult to find events and/or venues to adorn with the Gallery Furniture name and logo.
"We use sports to keep furniture in front of people's minds," he said. "It's good. It's topical. And it's something different."
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