WaxWorks scores with sports titles
Company grew business after acquiring TeamMarketing
By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 7/24/2008
JULY 24 | WaxWorks VideoWorks, a DVD wholesaler geared toward indie retailers, has become the primary sports title distributor for such large brands as ESPN.com and NASCAR.com.
WaxWorks began to build its sports business with the acquisition of sports production/distribution company TeamMarketing about two years ago. TeamMarketing distributes to retail nearly all the Bowl Championship Series college football games through a licensing agreement with Fox Sports. TeamMarketing also handles the men’s and women’s Final Four basketball championship titles through a similar arrangement with CBS.
Under WaxWorks’ tutelage, TeamMarketing is now responsible for a large chunk of DVD distribution to the sporting goods retail sector, comprising about 5,000 to 6,000 stores. It also oversees direct-to-consumer DVD pack-and-ship fulfillment for titles sold on ESPN.com, NASCAR.com and more than 100 college Web sites.
Terry Woodward, owner and president of WaxWorks Inc., estimates that 65% of college sports product is sold outside of the mass merchants, making college and sporting goods stores and sports-branded Web sites important channels.
Clayton Nichols, TeamMarketing VP, acknowledges that many DVD suppliers shy away from sports titles because the sales results per title are modest. But TeamMarketing has found success by aggregating accounts.
“You’re not going to sell 1 million units on a title,” said Nichols. “A great release is 150,000 units. The numbers are small. But if you have 100 different schools, then you have a business.”
In the last two years, WaxWorks TeamMarketing’s revenue has tripled, according to Woodward and Nichols.
A recent hit for TeamMarketing was its 2007 Tostitos Fiesta Bowl: Boise State Broncos vs. Oklahoma Sooners. It has sold 70,000 units since its February 2007 launch. That might seem unremarkable to many distributors, but TeamMarketing is calling it a victory. Targeted to a 250,000-person market surrounding the winning Boise State university, the DVD has been bought by approximately one out of four people residing in the city.
One of TeamMarketing’s key fourth-quarter titles is Dale Earnhardt Jr. Shifting Gears, which chronicles the racer’s historic decision to leave his late father’s team. Shifting Gears, which aired on ESPN, is slated to hit DVD in October.
TeamMarketing still produces and promotes titles as well.
“A lot of colleges want to do this, but they don’t know how,” said Woodward. “They can just send us the film, and we do the artwork, take care of the replication, marketing and distribution.”
