One Shot Wonder: "Get Out and Play" Revisited

Fiend at Court Unplugged

The Fiend at Court applauded the USTA initiatives that were announced on the first day of play during the 2020 US Open. These were primarily designed to promote and develop the growth of tennis in the United States. Those new campaigns included “Rally to Rebuild,” “Net Generation,” and “Tennis Industry United.”

These are all great initiatives. In fact, this site donated all proceeds received from amazon affiliate links during November and December 2020 to USTA Rally to Rebuild.

The new programs were unveiled in a media blitz that ran during the US Open. During the same time, the USTA aired a really well done commercial that ran periodically during the tournament. That commercial was examined in “Get Out and Play: Promotion of Tennis to the General Consumer.” In that article, this site gushed over the fact that the campaign seemed to be working evidenced by the fact that the public park near the Fiend at Court household was crowded with new tennis players shortly after the commercial started airing.

Amy Choyne is the USTA Chief Marketing Officer. In a quote that originally ran in a Sports Business Daily article, she indicated that this was the first USTA nationwide advertising campaign in the promotion of tennis in at least five years. In related news, based to Choyne’s LinkedIn profile, that is the approximate length of time that she has been her position with the USTA. Put another way, this is the first nationwide campaign that the USTA has conducted during her tenure.

The same Sports Business Daily article observed that in previous years, the USTA might have only directed a campaign like this internally to its 600,000-plus members. This was taken as a sign that the USTA has learned that to grow the game of tennis the sport has to be marketed to people who are not engaged in the sport. It is frequently observed on this site that promotion of tennis outside of already established tennis channels is nonexistent.

When Fiend at Court originally covered the “Get out and Play” commercial the assumption was that once the US Open concluded that the spot would continue to air on non-tennis channels. It never happened. iSpot.tv indicated that the last airing was on September 14, 2020. That correlates with last “day after” replay of the US Open Men’s finals.

To state this more clearly, the commercial apparently hasn’t aired since the conclusion of the US Open. Currently iSpot.tv has marked the commercial as “inactive” meaning it isn’t airing anywhere. So much for a nationwide campaign marketing tennis.

Meanwhile, the “Tennis Industry United” subscription email blast is self congratulatory on a recurring basis over the fact that participation in tennis rose in 2020. The data that backs that assertion is equipment sales for entry level racquets and red dot balls. I have no reason to question those figures. There is also a recent Sports Activity Council (SAC) report that is recently cited. I’m diving in to that study on Monday.

While there is certainly growth in tennis participation reflected in the purchase of entry level racquets, it is not clear if it is driven by a marketing campaign that has somehow escaped my attention. More likely is that the uptick in tennis participation is a side effect of the COVID pandemic. With gyms closed and a lot of recreational activities cancelled, an increase in new casual players is hardly a surprise.

The tennis industry should be happy about the increase in participation and they are. The tennis industry should not be deluding themselves or others with the notion that the increase is a result of nonexistent tennis promotional marketing.

The salient question comes down to this: What is the tennis industry and community doing to engage and retain those new players? Without those efforts the players who are giving the sport a try will be a temporary blip that disappears when life goes back to “normal.” The tennis industry should be acutely aware that the increase in tennis participation will be a temporary pandemic phenomenon without additional efforts. The press releases and industry newsletters don’t convey that understanding.