hiester.com

With all the hoopla over the NFL draft, I’m amazed that there haven’t been more creative attempts to profit from all the publicity. Here are some ideas for next year:

* DraftFlakes Breakfast Cereal – The box could feature photos of flakes like Roger Goodell, Drew Rosenhaus and fans who actually attend the draft in person.  There are so many NFL-related flakes, it would  be difficult to fit them all on the box. The cereal would be made up of small brown football flakes and huge green $ sign flakes. But here’s the best part. You can’t just go to the store and buy this box of cereal. Nooooooooooooooo. You have to first buy a PCBL, a Persnal Cereal Box License for $14,000. Only then do you have the right to buy the cereal for the estimated retail price of $12.99.

* Draft Beer Specials – A creative sports bar owner could cook up a scheme where the “first round” of beers purchased during the ten-minute window of the first pick would be priced really high. Let’s say the beer costs $50. Nobody would buy it, right? But, you could configure it so anyone buying a first round beer has a chance to win $250. As with the draft, there are no guarantees. Subsequent picks would be cheaper and the potential prizes less, except that once in a while  a lower round beer could win a very large price, let’s say $1000(think Tom Brady, a 6th round draft selection).  Customers could declare their table their “war room” (or as with the case of a pharmaceutical company I did work for–they made us rename our project meeting/scrum room from “war room” to “opportunity room”) and negotiate with other tables based on their prognostication that a certain round has been light on prizes, in which case they would trade up to that round.  I haven’t worked out all the details yet. There are probably bars that do this, but I don’t go to bars anymore so I wouldn’t know–and the only news I hear about bars is when people get shot inside of them, which happens too often here in Philadelphia.

* Sweepstakes – some product targeting the male 12-70 year-old demographic could hold a sweepstakes. Grand prize would be a chance for the winner and five friends to carry Mel Kiper down Broadway in an NFL-themed sedan chair, then sit with Mel durin the draft while he tells you exactly who is going to be drafted next–through all seven rounds– with 100% accuracy.  Given that his year-round job is to blab about the draft, make up mock drafts, inform us who is “sliding” and whose stock is rising, he should be able to get it right. Otherwise, it would be like Santa Claus leaving the wrong gifts for kids all over the world.