I always keep my eye on the big conglomerates. That being said, it definitely caught my attention when I saw this headline yesterday: New York Yankees Select Creative Artists Agency for Global Partnership and to Market Unprecedented Sponsorship Opportunities for New Yankee Stadium. Should this be surprising? CAA has already broken ground in a variety of ways, why not add another mega client to its stable?
On the same day that the Yankees and CAA jointly released that press release, Fortune magazine decided to release an extensive piece on Creative Artists Agency [A Hollywood agency with star power]. In the past, I have discussed only CAA’s sports business, but it is important to understand the interplay between all areas of its business.
Some CAA background facts:
- There are 6 controlling partners (Richard Lovett (President), Bryan Lourd, Kevin Huvane, Rick Nicita, David “Doc” O’Connor, and Rob Light). Lovett and Lourd may exude more power.
- Their entertainment division is overwhelming.
- They represent the best actors, writers, directors, and producers of mega movies.
- They put together most of the current top rated TV shows.
- They organize music tours for some of the best musicians in the industry.
- The PR division attempts to keep CAA very private and secretive
- Go to CAA’s website and see how bare it is.
- Lovett became good friends with Mark McCormarck (founder of IMG) before he passed away.
- Every agent at CAA works for every client. There are no specified agents that handle a certain client’s business alone.
- Profits may be on the downside while revenues continue to rise.
- Last year, bonuses were cut by 10%. This is expected to occur again this year. Expense accounts have been greatly reduced as well. Apparently many agents are looking to leave.
Lovett believes that CAA will be a force to be reckoned with in the sports industry. He is quoted as saying, “Sports is just a natural extension of our business.” Natural extension for a company always looking to grow by acquisition…
-Darren Heitner
7 replies on “CAA: Creative Acquisition Agency”
Wasserman Media Group also represents the new Giants Stadium in regards to getting a naming rights deal and sponsorship deals on the 4 large interior ads.
and IMG is working on getting the Cleveland Indians a sponsor name for that team’s stadium.
Yeah, I think WMG was the jump off for all of the other big boys getting involved in naming rights and sponsorship opportunities for stadiums. Casey Wasserman has a ton of money, and is hiring the right people to get involved. My problem with CAA is that unlike WMG, they are a television/film agency first. WMG was built from the ground up to manuever in the sports world. Integrating sports into an entertainment agency is not the easiest thing in the world. For instance, they bought Leon Rose’s agency thinking it would give them access to market LeBron James not even realizing that Rose doesn’t handle James’ marketing. They also didn’t realize that the only reason Rose gets clients is Wes Wesley. Or as David Falk says “Leon Rose doesn’t have pull, Wes Wesley has all the pull.” They should have paid Wes all of that money and he would have gotten them all of the top NBA clients they wanted. What I’m trying to say is that anyone that has a pulse to the sports industry would have known that to be the case. They basically bought the rights to a good sports transactional attorney. Therefore, paying Millions of dollars for his agency was a bad aquisition. I’d love to see the eventual return on investment with that one. As well, they had Matt Leinhart and couldn’t even keep him (on the marketing side) because of their lack of success in marketing him. The way commission structures are dictated by most of the collective bargaining agreements, it’s become more difficult to make the kind of money CAA is expecting to make just off of negotiating player contracts (unless you have a large stable of clients). If they want to do well in the sports industry, the first thing they need to do is hire a strong marketing team with experience marketing top players in the most marketable sports. I’m talking about basketball, tennis, golf, and auto racing. Hire someone from IMGs golf and tennis sector. Pay Bill Sanders from BDA, Jeff Schwartz from Excel, or Aaron and Eric Goodwin from GSM to handle basketball marketing. I don’t know who the big time marketing agent is for auto racing, but whoever that is scoop him up too! I think they already have the set up to handle football, but they have to do a better job if a guy like Leinhart already jumped ship. I think WMG will be the power agency in sports for years to come. They have the money, youth and intelligence of someone like Casey Wasserman, and they are hiring all of the right people. As well, unlike CAA, there focus is and base is in sports.
Way to break it down Nate. Excellent analysis.
Thanks…sorry for the typos…but I think you guys know what I was trying to convey.
[…] at Sports Agent Blog discusses the announcement that Creative Artists Agency will work with the Yankees to bring corporate sponsorships to new Yankee Sta…, among other business opportunities. He also sheds some light on CAA’s core business, which […]
[…] CAA has been employed by the New York Yankees to procure sponsors for their future new stadium [CAA: Creative Acquisition Agency]. If the Minnesota Vikings ever decided to drop their stadium’s name, which falls somewhere […]