UH working to protect sponsorship agreement

For several years now, the University of Hawaii has hung those large green "Protect This House" banners when it plays football at Aloha Stadium.

They are the trademark of sports apparel manufacturer Under Armour, and in recent weeks it has become apparent that UH is also trying very hard to protect this sponsorship account.

Under Armour is perhaps the most lucrative and visible sponsorship deal UH has had, one worth at least $566,000 in cash, trade and marketing support this year alone, according to terms of the contract.

Over the life of the eight-year deal, which entered its penultimate year this month, UH is to realize a minimum $4.1 million in cash, trade and marketing support.

While that pales in comparison to Notre Dame, which is said to have signed college athletics’ richest deal — a reported 10-year, $90 million agreement — earlier this year, it represents a windfall for a mid-major such as UH. Especially one so far off the beaten path of college sports.

The men’s basketball team has an agreement with Adidas and the women are contracted to Nike, while several other sports, including baseball and softball, have joined the Under Armour bandwagon.

Initially, however, at a time when Under Armour’s expanding client list included Auburn, Maryland and South Carolina, it was one of the few deals negotiated with a non-Bowl Championship Series school and helped give UH a certain amount of cachet in the process.

Of course, it came in what we now wistfully view as the heyday of UH football. The agreement was signed seven weeks after the Rainbow Warriors’ Sugar Bowl appearance, when the program was on a two-season, 23-4 run and optimism ran high for the future.

These days UH is mired in a streak of three consecutive losing seasons, including

4-20 over the last two. It has behooved UH to be creative in finding ways to push its sponsor’s product line while it waits for on-the-field victories to catch up.

The opening of the new expanded H-Zone store at Ward Centre, stocked with Under Armour products, the creation of an online H-Zone and relaunching of an outlet at the Stan Sheriff Center are three of the most visible ways of addressing the situation.

In addition, UH and Centerplate, the Aloha Stadium merchandising rights holder, have entered into an agreement for sales at UH home football games. Official UH logo items will be sold through Centerplate, with UH receiving a direct cut for the first time, the school said.

And, athletic director Ben Jay met with Under Armour officials in Baltimore last week. He tweeted from @HawaiiManoaAD, "My first  visit to Under Armour headquarters in Baltimore. Impressive. Looking to great things ahead especially about enhancing H-Zone."

It is probably another year before UH sits down with Under Armour to discuss an extension of their original agreement.

But it is definitely not too early to set about "protecting" another piece of its sponsorship base.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.