Despite more than a quarter-century, a venomous breakup, the relocation of the team almost 800 miles away, and a different NFL franchise in their city, the fan base that attached itself to the Houston Oilers football team remains nostalgic and longs for the brand that made the city bleed Columbia blue.
Q: What does a nuclear plant have in common with a football team?
On April 26, 1986, an explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant released a massive amount of radioactive material, contaminating large areas of Ukraine, Belarus, and other parts of Europe. The nuclear accident remains one of the most catastrophic nuclear disasters in history. Its immediate impact proved devastating, leading to numerous deaths and the forced evacuation of thousands of people from the affected areas. Some sociopolitical experts even surmise that it heavily contributed to the ultimate downfall and breakup of the government of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Decades later, the ongoing effects of the Chernobyl disaster continue to be felt. The region surrounding the plant, known as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and overseen once more by the Ukrainian government after a highly disruptive and dangerous post-Russian 2022 military invasion and occupation, remains largely uninhabitable.
Despite efforts to contain the radioactive contamination, the area still poses varied forms of considerable risks. Though international efforts to manage and secure the site persisted until the Russian/Ukrainian Battle of Chernobyl, a massive dome-like steel sarcophagus, known as the New Safe Confinement, was installed over the damaged reactor in 2016 to prevent further releases of radioactive materials. Still, leaks continue to occur, and experts expect the half-life of two primary isotopes to both be approximately 30 years, thereby creating a persistent presence of nuclear fallout in and around the exclusion zone for decades to come.
A: They both can live on for decades, even after major fallouts
More than a quarter-century after the franchise played its last game there, much of the City of Houston, the State of Texas, and many pockets of fans across the country still cling tightly to the nostalgia associated with the former Houston Oilers franchise of the National Football League (NFL), now located in Nashville, Tenn., and known as the Tennessee Titans. Both newly made and vintage Oilers merchandise is highly sought, Oilers fan conventions still occur regularly, and numerous fans have spent vast sums to customize vehicles with marks of a team that last played in The Bayou City in December 1996.
Although several NFL franchises relocated before and after the Oilers move (to multiple cities and/or on multiple occasions), and although a new NFL franchise came to Houston in 2002, none have undone the nostalgic grip of the Oiler brand.
Two books about the conditions surrounding the business decision that moved the franchise from Texas to Tennessee exist, and one book captures the 1979 season (when the Oilers finished one win shy of a Super Bowl appearance), but aside from a few articles written at various stages after the Oilers’ departure, no collective, larger-scale work has been discovered to exist that tells the story of why so many fans in various combinations and to various extents:
Still embrace the Oilers brand
Feebly support the Texans brand (if at all)
Feebly support the Titans brand (if at all)
Using principles of successful brand-building and examples of them, this book project seeks to investigate the story of why the Oilers’ franchise departure has left a fallout with an afterlife like no other in the NFL through anecdotal episodes told by fans who still bleed Columbia blue and red.
As this project uncovers reasons why fans still “luv” the Blue, it will also examine strategies that help build or transform sport property brands into ones that can be successfully managed in the highly competitive industry of activity/competition/play.
Select concepts of successful sport brand-building will be examined and proposed from persuasion principles of the field of psychology (Cialdini, 2021), branding principles of the field of marketing (Ries & Ries (2002), and fan-engagement principles of the sport industry (Rein, Kotler, & Shields, 2006; Rein, Shields, & Grossman, 2015).
Psychology of Influence
As the roots of the mainstay sport marketing principles of BIRG-ing (Basking In Reflected Glory) and CORF-ing (Cutting Off Reflected Failure), pertinent elements from the seven principles of Cialdini’s foundational work that was begun in 1984 on the psychological use of persuasion techniques in marketing will be discussed in terms of brand- building and illustrated by the stories of the people who were there when it happened for the Oilers in Houston.
Laws of Branding
Abundant proof exists to support the unique nature of the Houston Oilers brand. This book project seeks to gather both document and anecdotal evidence of this phenomenon to demonstrate the seminal marketing concept of positioning Al Ries (1972), this section will examine excerpts from his coauthored book on branding (Ries & Ries, 2002) that propagate building successful branding program around singularity, i.e., creating the perception in minds of prospects that no product on the market can rival yours, while promoting branding as the glue that holds the marketing mix together. These laws deal with establishment of ownership in the minds of consumers, fine-tuning the brand to influence purchase behaviors, and creating greater efficiencies in selling (Ries & Ries, 2002).
Sport-Specific Branding Strategies
Although the City of Houston has been and remains home to many globally and nationally iconic brands, this book project seeks evidence to support the premise that Oilers could be the strongest, most enduring one of those brands, despite its existence as a sports brand in a state and sport filled with them. The combined works of Rein, Kotler, and Shields (2006) and Rein, Shields, and Grossman (2015) yield numerous elements that will be discussed and illuminated, including:
How to establish ethos, or the character/credibility of the communicating brand as believed by its audience(s)
How fans connect to brands, both demographically and psychographically
How to generate brand concepts and identities while considering assets and target markets
How to intensify existing fan connections for greater involvement and profits
How to utilize brand transformation drivers, create/propagate enduring narratives, and harness new technologies
Were YOU a part of the Blue Luv?
Do you still HAVE luv for the Blue? Or do you know someone who did and left a legacy worth telling? If so, we want to talk to YOU! Please contact us at the following email address so that we may respond to you and make arrangements to listen to your story!
CONTACT ME: Dr. Benjamin D. “Ben” Goss • ben@redseatstrategy.com
After leaving for Tennessee in 1996 and getting mothballed after 1998, the Houston Oilers brand remains alive and well in hearts of fans in Texas and across the U.S.
Why?
This book explores answers to that question.
ABOUT THE BOOK
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Goss received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Louisiana Tech University and his doctorate from The University of Southern Mississippi.
He has taught numerous courses in sport business and business management in six accredited universities and business schools across the U.S. for more than 25 years. He has also taught in an international business degree program in China on four occasions, conducted executive education seminars at Louisiana State University (LSU), and been named as the Distinguished Sport Management Lecturer at the University of Alabama’s Paul W. “Bear” Bryant Museum.
Goss has served as a consultant since 2004 for two economic development/feasibility projects, several intercollegiate athletic departments and other sport properties, an independent college basketball media company, and a law firm.
He is the author of numerous academic refereed journal publications and conference presentations, which have received seven awards, and he wrote a sport business revenue strategy column called “Leaving Money On The Table” for The Tao Of Sports.
Goss co-founded a sport business academic journal in 2007. His work has also been featured in The Huffington Post, The Orlando Sentinel, Facility Manager Magazine, Biz Summits, College Athletics Clips, and The Mobile Press Register. He was also an outside editor for the J.W. Wiley & Sons imprint Zebras & Cheetahs.
In his entrepreneurial endeavors, he is the founder and owner of Red Seat Strategy, a boutique consulting firm; the originator and proprietor of the Long Ball City baseball brand; and the publisher of Miss Ya Blue!, the online magazine of Houston Oilers Nostalgia.
In 2011, Goss was named to the Springfield (Mo.) Business Journal’s annual Forty Under 40 class of community business leaders.