The NHL does a horrible job marketing itself

[bellringer77]

They got 4 games on tonight for a Friday night with the college football done, baseball done, NFL about done and they slot them in two sets of start times with no late night game for the west coast….

 

[qc14]

Jesus christ man the league can do absolutely nothing right for most people. Why doesn't the league market it's stars more? Why are all the players so boring? Why is everything so old school? Why don't they try to grow the game? On and on and on and on.

Then when the league actually does new, different things those same people instantly flip the other way. The ads are corny, the players in them aren't recognizable. The Winter Classic sucks because I don't watch it on TV. There shouldn't be an outdoor game in Florida. The draft at the Sphere is a gimmick. The NHL should try to directly compete with the College Football Playoffs on TV. Etc. etc.

Both of these ads are great. "Best sport, worst league" is fast approaching "mushy middle" as a phrase for me that just instantly gives away that whoever's using it doesn't know what the f*** they're talking about and just likes to complain for the sake of complaining.

 

[The Marquis]

The key demo for NHL marketing is 18-34. We're the ones most likely to waste disposable income and free time on sports, and we're also less settled in our ways. Attract a young person to the sport before preferences set in, and you'll have a fan for 40+ years. That's a better bet than trying to sway middle-aged people who have never gotten into hockey.

The point is that young people only see commercials during sports games--and even then most people find ways around it. These commercials should (and are) on social media, but where else do you want them? On TBS re-runs of "Friends?"

Nope, on YouTube, streaming services, ESPN during other sports. Whatever 18-34 year olds are watching. Pro wrestling? I don’t know. Definitely not reruns of friends.

 

[GeeoffBrown]

I guess one thing about tipping is that it's something that old people complain about because the longer you have lived, the lower the % tip you remember. So, an ad about tipping does not appeal to an 18-35 audience.

 

[PaulD]

That's extremely short-sighted. If the league folded tomorrow I guarantee over half of the "die-hard hockey fans" wouldn't start watching the KHL / lower leagues.

Profit comes from growth. Even if you take away corporate profit, hockey is already the most gate-kept major North American sport; if the players make any less money than they do now, why wouldn't parents just enroll their kids in soccer, football, baseball, basketball where the costs are fewer, the skills training less specialized, the injuries fewer/less debilitating, and the professional opportunities are both more varied and lucrative?

A sport like hockey requires specialized equipment; specialized playing surface; and a team. It's expensive to start playing, it's expensive to keep playing, and if anyone makes it to the top, they make millions less than professional athletes in other team sports; an elite hockey player might only make 50-100 million in a career, where there are professionals in baseball, basketball, football, soccer, making that in a single contract.

So yeah - if you like the highest professional level of hockey being played in North America, you do want growth. I also could not care less about corporate profit but I care about the health of the sport; the players aren't playing for free. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that if you polled every player if they wanted the League to grow, the answer would be a near-unanimous "yes."

It's like none of you have ever had a job or practised business logistics before.

"if the league folded tomorrow" ....haa!
Well who cares because we know that will never happen.

Fans care about the game once the puck drops.......groupies care about celebrity athletes and bigger crowds.

"Grow the game" I laugh everytime I hear a fan parrot that dumb ass phrase.

 

[PaulD]

People love superstars and larger then life personalities. The NHL tries is best to squash any of that nonsense. Instead they throw out commercials with shy, awkward every day looking dudes that most non sports fans couldn't tell if that was their neighbor Bob or a professional athlete.

ya want your athletes to be house hold celebrities.....ain't that special

do you want the celebrities to expand into pro sports leagues too.

 

[The Gr8 Dane]

Why are you so worried about the game growing? Who cares? Let the billionaire owners figure it out. None of our concern. It shouldn’t really matter to fans. I like watching the NHL, I don't care about it growing or making more money.

The average human child in Canada and America can't even afford to play the sport but people are crying about ads not growing the game lol

 

[LokiDog]

If the league did know how to market itself the Hughes and Tkachuks would be the most commonly known players in the league. Instead we are supposed to be interested in stoicism and “get pucks to the net and bring a better effort, ya know”.

 

[BruinDust]

Some of you should go do a marketing course and learn what the main objectives of advertising are.

People are on a message board talking about these NHL ads. Mission accomplished.

 

[KirkAlbuquerque]

yawn

 

[JohanFranzenstein]

The tipping commercial might be one of the funnier ads the NHL has put out in over a decade.


And for whatever it's worth, when the NHL says they want to "grow the game", that means "hey women, black people, and gays, give us your money"

 

[KirkAlbuquerque]

This is shortly after MJ quit basketball and shortly after he cut off sports illustrated entirely to be fair.

And the Rangers were champs. That’s good for the league

 

[ZachaFlockaFlame]

Realizing this in 2025 was your first mistake, everyone already knows the league does a dogshit job at marketing compared to the other 3 major sports. NFL LAPS them and so does the NBA, the MLB already has fans that are legit grandfathered in the States and in general so they don't need to market as much either.

I still say this is a cursed image

The NBA's product is garbage right now and they still lap the NHL because of said marketing

 

[Team_Spirit]

Do we really need more expensive tickets and the NFL crowd?

No

 

[Gaylord Q Tinkledink]

Yeah, i mean the players and fans have said the new playoff format sucks.

The NHL ? Claims they did a poll and found "a bunch of people love it", but I've never seen where that poll was conducted, or the actual results of it.

People who break down hockey games are getting cease and desist letters..

They did no prior marketing to see if fans would like to see a 4 nation tournament and the proof is in the pudding with a bunch of tickets still available at stupid costs.

The NHL went to Australia and they have a player who's from Australia and didnt include the team. I'll say, maybe the Blues didn't want to, but still should have tried harder to get him.

The NHL released NFTs when NFTs were basically dead.

The NHL has and has had some of the stupidest blackouts. I give 0 f***s about other sports, so this might just be an old man boomer rant, but games aren't available unless you pay a stupid amount to see just your team.

Chicago fans i believe it was were saying when you live IN CHICAGO you have a hard time watching the team. Like what in the absolute f*** is that ?

25 years ago, here in the Ottawa valley you couldn't watch the sens on TV unless it was a sell out.

I bought NHL Centre Ice and went to watch a Nashville - Florida game and
.. IT WAS f***ING BLACKED OUT.

The NHL, the teams, the schedule markers, someone else, or all of them are too f***ing stupid to spread games out.

Hey, we have 13 games on Saturday !!! Yeah f***ing 8 of them start at 7.

You have officials that never have to clarify on anything they do. You're not allowed to criticize them, otherwise you get fined and the refs will then hold a grudge against you.

You only need to shelter someone like that when they suck at their job.

From suspensions, to goalie interference, to headsets, to anything and everything else theres no consistency. It's not even close.

The NHL is an old boy's club where you can be almost as stupid and as inept as possible, but here you are getting more and more jobs.

You signed a deal with f***ing Fanatics, a trash company that produces overpriced trash. Despite the people and other leagues who went that route before you so you wouldn't have to go that way, you did.

Edit: forgot to add that their highlights that are created suck. They pick random ass things to show.

 

[StlBigFly]

I mean…

I’ve worked in creative spaces.

It’s a long season and there’s a ton of different things, from four nations, winter classics. There’s a dozen different broadcast partners. They won’t be spending a whole ton of time conceptualizing some ads that appear on only 2 or 3 of the 12 broadcasts.

I don’t think those ads are horrible. They’re using active players and trying to be funny, clean edits.

If they were mailing it in these would be waaay worse. They’re just not going to be a super high priority relative to a lot of other stuff.

 

[BB79]

"we"? who is "we"? Fans don't get anything out of the league growing. Couldn't give a crap about their profits. What's it to me?

You don't enjoy watching your team play meaningless games against western conference teams for 40% of the season? You don't like getting shook down at the concession stand paying $40 for 8 french fries? I thought I was the only one!

100% agree.

 

[Tie Domi Esquire]

The part where 2/3rds of your top line is from the American Southwest.
And how several of your other impact players came through the NCAA, and the only way the NCAA's superior methods for developing talent could be leveraged for hockey is if the sport's popularity and resources grew significantly in the US.

Maybe that's why the Leafs do nothing when the games get hard.

 

[GrumpyKoala]

Edited:
Dana White can mind his own potatoes

 

[kerrabria]

Maybe that's why the Leafs do nothing when the games get hard.

It’s are the hometown boys (Marner, Tavares, Brodie) who are the center of criticism.

 

[holy]

I actually think hockey is in a better place than basketball cause of the actual product right now. But yeah it's not well marketed.

 

[hangman005]

Maybe they need I help, I feel I market my onlyfans pretty well

 

[Strangle]

Another useless thing NHL does is give out NMC and NTC to every pubber on earth.

Owners should only focus on that in next CBA. Grandfather all the nmcs and ntcs already in place. But get rid of them for next CBA. That's should be a priority. Laughed out the room in any other league. NBA has two and NFL would laugh the player outta the room.

And black list the gm that started giving their 11 th best player nmcs.

I keep thinking that a NTC or NMC should have some sort of restrictions. Like they can only be applied in the first and last years of the contracts.

Or they come with a cost, somehow. I don’t know how you’d do something like subtract $3-$5m per year on a contract if it comes with a NMC but the NMC really should lower the salary, which they never seem to actually do.

NMC just generally suck for the team, the fans, the league ….. everyone except the player.

I know this ‘climate’ of pro-workers rights hates to hear stuff like this, but the pendulum of power has swung way too far in the players direction.

It needs to come back towards the teams again. No one wants an NBA like league in the NHL, where your star player is also the GM’s boss

 

[Strangle]

This is an underrated point. It's also one of the reasons I like the NCAA taking over as the primary route to the NHL. Taking kids out of their parents' home to do part-time high school and live with a billet family is f***ing weird. If you spend your formative years basically working a full-time job with a bunch of other teenage boys, you're not gonna turn out normal. No wonder so much despicable shit has gone on with Hockey Canada. Keep these teenagers in their hometowns, properly socialize them at mixed-gender high schools, then let them spend a year or two at college. The players will turn out more relatable and marketable.

You know what’s really weird? Universities pretending to give amateur athletes an education so they can make money off their performances.

At least in the OHL it’s an honest business, without the ‘pretend degree’

You know that Antonio brown got into college? I don’t think he graduated, but that guy legit can’t even read or write.

The NCAA is a joke because there is supposed to be an academic standard, but that’s all just a big lie and everyone knows it

 

[ijuka]

Jesus christ man the league can do absolutely nothing right for most people. Why doesn't the league market it's stars more? Why are all the players so boring? Why is everything so old school? Why don't they try to grow the game? On and on and on and on.

Then when the league actually does new, different things those same people instantly flip the other way. The ads are corny, the players in them aren't recognizable. The Winter Classic sucks because I don't watch it on TV. There shouldn't be an outdoor game in Florida. The draft at the Sphere is a gimmick. The NHL should try to directly compete with the College Football Playoffs on TV. Etc. etc.

Both of these ads are great. "Best sport, worst league" is fast approaching "mushy middle" as a phrase for me that just instantly gives away that whoever's using it doesn't know what the f*** they're talking about and just likes to complain for the sake of complaining.

Have you ever heard of nuance? It's perfectly possible for you to think that NHL should try something new, but for you to also think that the new things NHL attempts are terrible. It's not rocket science, so what's so difficult here?

I maintain that NHL should do away with blackouts and broadcasting rights and just offer a single ~15 dollar subscription to the entire league, and to not do exclusive deals at all(unlimited shared licenses, nothing exclusive to anyone). They'd likely make more profit via that method than whatever they're doing right now, because it would maximize reach. The current approach minimizes it.