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Yanks and 'Boys Join Forces

From the "What took you so long department", came this announcement from the New York Yankees and Dallas Cowboys that they had formed a sports business enterprise together with, who else, Goldman Sachs and a private equity company from Dallas CIC Partners. The company, to be called Legends Hospitality Management will offer a broad range of sports business services. It will focus initially on catering, concessions, retail merchandising and other services for major sports and entertainment facilities. Initially it will provide catering, concessions and merchandising within the new Yankee Stadium and the new Cowboys Stadium.

The Yankees and Cowboys will provide the expertise for the venture while Goldman Sachs, a partner with the Yankees in YES Network the Yankees regional cable network, and CIC will provide financing. This business is a natural for both teams as they seek to leverage the opening of their new stadiums and try to boost the revenue streams in as many ways as possible. The Yankees and the Cowboys are the two biggest brands in American sports so it's only natural for them to join together to market the brands aggressively both within the new stadiums and in as many additional venues as possible.

Legends will also attempt to sell their expertise to other professional and college teams, which may be a bit harder task then perhaps it seems at first glance. After all, who in professional sports wants to give MORE money to either the Yankees or the Cowboys. Most, if not all, of the other baseball and football teams feel they are already operating at a significant disadvantage when it comes to those two, so maybe the NBA and college will be their best targets.

Full post as published by Sports Biz on October 20, 2008 (boomark / email).