UH marketers turn eyes toward the future

Even as the University of Hawaii prepares to open its football season-ticket drive for 2011, it also will be selling 2012 in full, glossy color.

The Warriors, who have one final season in the Western Athletic Conference, their home for 32 years, are running a full-page ad in a prominent preseason publication touting their impending Mountain West Conference membership that begins July 1, 2012.

In the ad, quarterback Bryant Moniz is posed on the beach, football in hand, looking through sunglasses at the ocean, which is emblazoned with "Mountain West on the horizon in 2012" under a sun that contains the MWC logo.

And, just to drive home the point of 2012, the jersey number for Moniz, a senior who won’t be around in ’12, is photo-shopped to 12 from his usual 17.

Etched into the sand is the UH logo and website address.

The ad will appear in the debuting MWC regional edition of Lindy’s football preview. Lindy’s is celebrating its 30th year and MWC associate commissioner Dan Butterly said, "This is the first time in Mountain West history we will have a leading national publisher produce a Mountain West-specific preseason college football magazine."

"We felt like it was merited, fans deserved it and the conference earned it on the field," said Lyn Scarbrough, marketing manager for Lindy’s.

John McNamara, UH associate athletic director, said the ad will cost UH about $4,000. He called it a "great opportunity for us to get some nice regional exposure for the program and tout the fact that we are going into the MWC and, at the same time, promote our (state)."

Locally, McNamara said, "it is never too early to get people excited about our future. The thing we really want to push in season-ticket (sales) is the inference that even though the MWC is a year away, now is the time to get your seats in the locations you want in preparation for the first year in the MWC."

Season-ticket renewals go out this month and new sales are scheduled to begin in July. McNamara said: "Even though we are looking forward to a phenomenal final season in the WAC, it is a good time to lock in seats for the first season in the MWC."

Scarbrough said Lindy’s annually publishes six college football preseason magazines — one national edition and five regional editions (Pac-12, Big 10, Big 12, Southeastern and Atlantic Coast conferences) — and will add the MWC. The MWC edition will be circulated in eight Western states, including Hawaii, beginning in early July, Scarbrough said. In the national edition, UH is picked to win the WAC.

In the regional edition, however, Scarbrough said 11 MWC schools — the eight current members and three impending members (UH, Fresno State and Nevada) — will be featured.

McNamara said, "we want (prospective recruits) to turn the pages and say, ‘Hawaii is coming in, great!’"