Charlotte Battery Feature - www.charlestonbattery.com

Friday, July 31, 2015

Andrew Bell, president of the Charleston Battery, is the club executive who navigated the process that culminated Thursday in the announcement of the naming-rights agreement for MUSC Health Stadium. He spent the week in meetings with other USL league executives in Colorado, and was in transit to Charleston Thursday. We caught up with him between flights.

Charleston Battery: The Battery has been associated with Blackbaud Stadium since 1999. Why the change? Why now?

Andrew Bell: The major sponsorship dynamic has changed for us in the past few years as the Charleston Battery has grown. Blackbaud has been involved in the process that led to our expanded partnership with MUSC and their willingness to assist has been fantastic.

Of course Blackbaud will remain as a major sponsor, which is very important to us. The Nonprofit of the Match partnership is a great concept, and the way we are building on it, together with the increased involvement of our players in the community, makes it unique.

We have so many historic links and Blackbaud’s part in the Charleston Battery legacy continues.

(Editor’s note: We also asked Blackbaud for comment, and got this reply from Mike Gianoni, Blackbaud’s president and chief executive officer: “Blackbaud and the Battery have grown up together in the Lowcountry, sharing a combined history that began with Tony Bakker, who founded both. Our partnership with the Battery was and continues to be a demonstration of our commitment to our hometown. Today, we welcome MUSC Health into that partnership as Blackbaud’s commitment to the communities where we live and work endures.”)

CB: What prompted this? 

AB: Soccer has become increasingly relevant in the U.S. over the past few years and the Charleston Battery has been growing in tandem with this general rise in interest.

We’ve also been able to increase the number of major events that we host, whether it’s the exhibition games with the likes of the EPL’s West Brom or Bolton or the Southern Ground Music and Food Festival with Zac Brown Band.

Add events like these to the growing attendance at Battery soccer matches this year and the metrics start to add up. I wouldn’t say that it makes expanded partnerships like these inevitable, but it certainly makes them much more likely.

CB: Did you have other suitors, other offers? Was the Battery initiating talks about the stadium naming rights, or fielding inquiries?

AB: A little bit of both. There were a couple of other interested parties but in the end it just seemed like the progression and expansion of our partnership with MUSC Health was the best fit. There’s a tremendous amount of synergy, and I know from a team standpoint that our technical staff is very pleased to be able to continue to work with the MUSC Sports Med folks.

CB: How long did it take to reach an agreement?

AB: MUSC Health is a long-term partner of ours since 2008 and as we do with all of our sponsors we evaluate the relationship on a fairly regularly basis.

Once we got to the point where stadium naming rights were a viable opportunity for MUSC Health, the agreement was finalized very quickly.

CB: Is the stadium naming deal purely a cash transaction, or is there an agreement for services too, given the club’s long history with MUSC Health Sports Medicine Team?

AB: This is a multi-faceted agreement, but the care that our athletes receive was always our primary concern. I happen to think that MUSC Health provides the best sports medicine coverage in the state, so being able to continue working with Bobby (Weisenberger, head athletic trainer), Mike (Barr, physical therapist), Shane Woolf (team physician), Alec (DeCastro, team physician) and the rest of their team is very gratifying.

MUSC Health can and does bring a tremendous amount to a partnership like this, certainly much more than just a set dollar amount.

CB: How do you go about putting a value on a stadium like this one? 

AB: We have a pretty good gauge on the value of our product and we do keep track of what’s happening in our industry as a whole.

MUSC Health Stadium is much more than just a venue for Charleston Battery soccer matches we are a hub for the entire community. Despite being privately owned we’ve always viewed ourselves as very much a public resource, and you see that in the many non-soccer events that we host, particularly the charitable ones.

CB: MUSC Health Stadium is a historic place for soccer in the United States and it’s adored by soccer fans who aren’t even from Charleston. But it’s also a venue that was built specifically for soccer, with only a soccer club as a primary tenant. What does this deal say about the evolution of the game and the club here in Charleston?

AB: We’re the longest continuously operating pro soccer club in the U.S., and we predate Major League Soccer by three years. We’re definitely here to stay and I’m very excited about the opportunities and developments that are coming in the next few years.

We’ve seen a rise in the interest in the Charleston Battery in the past couple of years, and we’ve also seen a change in the way the club is supported with a much more engaged fan base. The levels of media interest have followed suit.

Part of what makes us unique are the teams and players we have brought to the city for our games and events. In February this year we had two FIFA World Cup winners playing in a game on our pitch, Kaka and David Villa. That’s remarkable! We credentialed more than 50 individual journalists and media representatives for that game alone.

Five years ago we couldn’t have dreamed that we would have the chance to bring something that cool to our city, but now it’s a reality. For fans of soccer it’s amazing, but even for casual sports fans it can also be a really interesting story.

CB: What changes should Battery fans anticipate in the coming weeks? How about over the next year? What will the club prioritize with this new revenue? 

AB: Our core mission remains the same, which is to provide our fans with the absolute best product that we can, both on and off the field.

There will be some tangible, visible changes at the stadium, and there is one particular, major addition coming that relates to this new deal. We’ve been working on improving our visibility to the 9 million vehicles that drive past the stadium on Interstate 526 annually, and in the next few weeks you will see a significant improvement in that respect.

CB: How is MUSC Health Stadium owned? 

AB: MUSC Health Stadium remains a privately owned facility. We are very proud of our history as the first soccer-specific stadium to open in the modern era, and I’m particularly exited about the beginnings of this new chapter in our story.

CB: USL is growing by leaps and bounds, and there’s a push by the league to get its teams into soccer-specific stadia over the next few years. But it’s still unusual for a USL team to effectively own its own stadium. What advantages does that give the Battery?

AB: We get to control all aspects of the fan experience, which is important because it allows us to be immediately responsive to the wishes of our supporters.

You can see it at the Battery games with the local craft beers that we offer, something that followed a direct request from our supporters group.

Likewise the way we allow our fans to enter the stadium with the “March to the Match” and the modifications we made to the supporters’ section to give them space for the drums. That was important to them, and so of course it becomes important to us. They are as much of a driving force behind our evolution as our staff or players.

Owning the stadium also gives us the flexibility to host other events, which has greatly increased our relevance to the community as a whole.

For example, if Coach Lundy (Ralph Lundy Jr., head coach of College of Charleston’s men’s soccer team) has a problem with his stadium and needs to use ours for a game or two, we can do that and we can do it quickly.

CB: You’ve just come from the USL Board of Governors’ Conference in Colorado, which was held in conjunction with Major League Soccer’s All-Star Week. What kinds of questions and feedback did you get from other USL executives?

AB: There is a good spirit of partnership and support within the current USL Board of Governors. We are all helping each other as much as possible and the really good news is that there are multiple teams working on similar scaled (and in some cases much larger) projects. It always helps to be able to lean on contemporaries for ideas and support.

CB: What’s your assessment of the short-term future of USL and lower-division soccer in the United States? Where does the Battery stand in that future?

AB: I am very bullish about the direction USL senior management is taking the league. We are in an era of unprecedented growth and there are some really exciting developments that will be rolled out in the coming months. The Charleston Battery will continue our focus on being as relevant a part of that process as possible, same as we always have done!