The Boston Celtics Go Small to Help Hometown Businesses With Vistaprint

As the Boston Celtics hope to capture their 18th championship in franchise history in this year's NBA Finals, small businesses will be at the heart of the team's story thanks to a multi-year partnership with jersey patch sponsor Vistaprint. The marketing connection between the Celtics and Vista—the parent brand of Vistaprint, rebranded after the acquisition of graphic design platform Crello last year—is designed to burnish the team's image and the brand's affinity among New England's regional community of fans and businesses. Vista CMO Ricky Engelberg joined the company in September 2019. He had experience in sports marketing, having worked at Nike for over 20 years, and had a blank slate to design Vista's next marketing plan. "You think about how do you truly find things that unify communities," he said of his approach. "Culture is a big place, and at the heart of culture is sports in a lot of cases. Sports, music, design—all these things leverage culture. But when you think about sports, it's such a great unifier." Brands Show Up in Unique Ways at Women’s College Softball World Series Small business hits the big time One of the ideas that stuck with Engelberg was how Vista could "make small feel big" and allow small businesses to feel celebrated. The Waltham, Massachusetts-based Vista had some experience in sports, having previously partnered with the NHL's Boston Bruins. At the end of 2019-'20 season, the Celtics' sponsorship deal with General Electric was set to expire. "GE was a fantastic partner, but we knew based on some of their goals and objectives and other things that they were likely not going to renew," Ted Dalton, svp of corporate partnerships and business development with the Celtics, told Adweek. The franchise soon began a conversation with the Cimpress-owned Vista. Both sides were close to finalizing an agreement in early 2020 until negotiations were paused when Covid-19 hit. Before the Celtics and Vista could agree on a sponsorship deal, they partnered on a program titled Food for Heroes. The 12-week community initiative supported local restaurants while also providing meals to frontline workers throughout Massachusetts during the difficult early days of the pandemic. Later on in 2020, they came to an agreement on a multi-year sponsorship deal where the Celtics uniform is branded with a Vistaprint logo. The deal is valued between $10 million and $15 million per year, according to CNBC. Disney Locks in 3 Key Sponsors for ESPN’s Fifty/50 Title IX Initiative Commitment to small and Black-owned businesses The arrangement goes beyond the sponsorship patch as both the Celtics and Vista have spent the past two seasons promoting small businesses. As a resource for designing business cards, labels, packaging and other branding materials, Vista is a design and marketing partner to millions of small businesses around the world. With the Celtics, Vista is placing small businesses on its signage in the team's home arena, the TD Garden, during games. This includes the Jumbotron, as well as courtside signage and the Celtics' social media accounts. "They're able to take valuable sponsorship assets and essentially turn them over to small businesses in the New England area and allow them the visibility and raise them up to being featured in the community," said Tuck Burch, head of marketing at Vista's sports marketing agency of record, Excel Sports Management. For Dalton, who has been with the Celtics since 2005, it's the first time a partner had come to the franchise with the goal of supporting small businesses. The pandemic presented the inspiration to forge a more direct connection with small businesses in the team's New England backyard. It's not a typical move for an NBA brand like the Celtics, who would normally look for an equally high-profile corporate brand—particularly in the beverage or apparel categories—to leverage from a marketing and revenue standpoint. But appealing to the grassroots is increasingly considered necessary to local economies. Plus, this kind of acknowledgement deepens the emotional bonds of a team with its fans and hometown. Small businesses still need that support, given the severe impact of the pandemic. According to a Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences survey, 43% of businesses had closed temporarily by April 2020, with three-quarters of respondents only having enough cash on hand to last at most two months. Over the past two seasons, Vista, the Celtics' Shamrock Foundation and the NAACP have teamed up for the Power Forward Small Business Grant, awarding $25,000 to New England Black-owned businesses. Vistaprint is also providing customized design and marketing assistance. The Milwaukee Bucks Hit the Purpose Bullseye Sports marketing appeal Vista has ratcheted up its sports marketing activity. The brand signed a multi-year partnership with the Washington Commanders of the NFL last year and Liverpool FC of the Premier League this year. Both deals are similar to its partnership with the Celtics in that Vista will promote local businesses in the teams' hometowns. "If you're looking for passionate eyeballs and loyal eyeballs, 97 of the top 100 live events on broadcast in the past year were sporting events," said Joe Favorito, a sports marketing expert and Columbia University professor. "If you're looking for that visibility, in capturing that moment, capturing that emotion, it's pretty hard to say if there's any other place outside of live sports where you can capture that consistent fan presence." Value of a sponsorship patch Vista redesigned its logo after its first season. Originally a large V with Vistaprint written underneath, Engelberg said the design's performance, from a visibility standpoint, was in the middle of the pack of the NBA. After going through 140 different iterations, the Celtics settled on the current design that features a two-rowed spelling of Vistaprint with an outline inspired by Massachusetts city signs. Engelberg said mid-season analytics data put the Vistaprint patch at a higher league rank from a visibility and readability standpoint. The NBA allowed brands to place patches on jerseys starting in 2017, and the combined value of the program reached an estimated $225 million this season. The Celtics have made the playoffs in 14 out of the last 15 years. They have also qualified for the Eastern Conference Finals seven times in that span. The value of the team's history combined with its current success adds even more value to the partnership since the team is playing regularly in higher profile games. According to Excel Analytics, the Vistaprint logo averaged 5.42 minutes of broadcast exposure time per game during Boston's current playoff run. The jersey patch for an NBA team averaged about $25,000 in Nielsen's Quality Index Media Value (QIMV) per game during the 2020-'21 regular season. QIMV takes into account the size, location, duration, number of brand hits and impact across linear TV, streaming, social media, digital media and PR. For the 2020-'21 postseason, excluding the finals, the average QIMV for a jersey patch per game was $148,000. For the 2020-'21 finals, the average QIMV for a jersey patch per game was $917,000. Favorito said making the finals for a brand is more of the cherry on top of the sundae. Brands can't always rely on teams being successful. The real value in the deal is the brand being relevant to consumers throughout the entire year through its activity in the community. "We wanted to have a really deep, meaningful relationship with whomever we were going to put on our jersey, just out of respect to our brand and their brand," said Dalton. "To make sure that we were doing this for the right reasons and that it brought value to fans, it brought value to the community and brought value to whomever is following or watching the Celtics." Briner League Baseball: How the Portland Pickles Crafted a Marketing Franchise