MARKETING THE GREEN BAY PACKERS E Craig B enzel ’86 Helps Packers Win Championships; Guards History, Tradition

very day, someone pulls up outside Craig Benzel’s workplace and snaps a photo of it.

“There hasn’t been a day since I started here six years ago that I haven’t seen it happen,” says Benzel, ’86, director of marketing and corporate accounts with the Green Bay Packers.

It could be a slight exaggeration, and probably is, since Benzel has more pressing things to do than to stare out the window all day. But it’s not too far a stretch neither of the truth nor of the imagination. Benzel works at Lambeau Field, home of the Packers, the professional football team that has won more championship titles than any other team in the National Football League. (Twelve, to be exact.)

From his modern office at the Lambeau Field Atrium, the newly refurbished, multi-million dollar glass-andbrick, year-round facility housing Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wis., Benzel oversees more than 100 corporate accounts that advertise with or do sponsorships with the Packers.

“There are no hidden agendas with this job,” he says. “We are all here to help the Packers win championships. I’m here to bring in revenue so that the team can sign the best possible free agents.”

That means partnering with health care facilities and automobile dealerships, getting major electronics companies, such as Sony, to be the official provider of electronic components on the field, negotiating with area tribal communities to host football clinics or perform halftime entertainment, or arranging any of a slew of promotions that can bring in cold hard cash.

“What is fun about my job is knowing a little about a lot,” Benzel says. “Every day is different.”

Indeed, every minute is different in the workday of this Ripon alum. One minute he’s going over corporate contracts with the company’s attorney, while the next minute he’s arranging for circus elephants to eat at Curly’s Pub. (Named after Packers founder and first coach E. L. “Curly” Lambeau, the on-site restaurant touts “NFL-sized portions” and features Packers history in its décor). Benzel gets to travel with the team to away games and while he has a backstage pass to all of the Packers games, he’s not always able to purely be a fan. He’s the one who coordinates the team’s entrance onto the field through the “tunnel” during pre-game introductions. “It looks like it just happens spontaneously, but it’s me in the back wearing a headset working on the timing,” he says. “When people attend a game, they have no idea what goes on behind the scenes.” It’s not till after halftime that he can settle down and start enjoying the game.

This Aug. 11 marks the 85th birthday of the Packers. And even though Benzel’s job ostensibly is to bring in revenue for the Packers organization, he says he also acts as guardian of the team’s history and image.

The Green Bay Packers organization is the last remaining publicly owned professional sports team, with more than 111,000 shareholders owning more than 4.7 million shares of stock. The team has season ticket holders from every state in the nation except Vermont, Rhode Island and West Virginia. More than 60,000 people are on a 30-year waiting list for tickets.

“Some people weep when they see Lambeau Field in person for the first time,” Benzel says. “It’s a special place for people. My biggest responsibility is making sure we don’t do anything that will damage the reputation of the 80-plus year of tradition that came before us.”

The name Packers is older than any other team name. In its early years, it was first the Indian Packers, named after the now-defunct Indian Packing Co., whose employee Curly Lambeau was one of the founding members. After Indian Packing Co. went out of business, the team was called Acme Packers for a short time. Lambeau and George Calhoun started the team with a meeting held at the Green Bay Press-Gazette newspaper office, according to the official Web site of the Green Bay Packers, www.packers.com.

The team has 20 Professional Hall of Famers, more than any other NFL team except the Chicago Bears. Lambeau Field (originally City Stadium — renamed in 1965 following Lambeau’s death) was built in 1957 and is the oldest NFL stadium in continuous use. The Packers were also the first team to open a hall of fame and museum, which they did in 1967, according to www.packers.com

“We have a real sense of protection of the image and of the history,” Benzel says. “We don’t want to wreck it for anyone.”

Part of that sense of protection lies in making sure the Packers organization doesn’t partner with any company that could reflect poorly upon the wholesome, family-friendly image it strives to maintain. Gambling and cigarettes are two vices the Packers don’t wish to promote. “Casinos advertise with a lot of sports teams but in the Packers organization, we don’t have deals with casinos or tobacco companies,” he says.

Benzel signed on with the Packers in 1998. Except for a stint selling mattresses briefly after graduating from Ripon, most of his career life has been in sports marketing and promotions. He lists the Milwaukee Brewers as his first “real” job. He worked there for 2 1/2 years before taking a job with the athletic department at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, where he also worked on his master’s degree in business administration. From 1993-98, he worked for the Milwaukee Wave indoor soccer team.

“The minor leagues are a great proving area to test your skills,” he says. “You wear many different hats.”

His responsibilities with the Packers can be boiled down to three areas: advertising, tourism and game-day entertainment. His “lean and mean” staff of five (including him) coordinates the music, scoreboard contests, player introductions and halftime entertainment.

Before the multimillion-dollar renovation of Lambeau Field, his department concerned itself mainly with the 10 home game days (two pre-season and eight regular season). But since the addition of the Lambeau Atrium, a year-round facility open to the public, he and the fans have had to rethink Lambeau Field.

“Now we are trying to get the word out that Lambeau Field is more than just the football games,” he says. “Our aim is to market Lambeau Field as a year-round destination. What we are telling people is, ‘You can experience Lambeau Field.’”

The Lambeau Field Atrium offers the Packers Hall of Fame, two restaurants open year-round (Curly’s Pub and the Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame Grill) and the Packers Pro Shop.

Despite the reputation of the Green Bay Packers as being an above-average NFL team, Benzel describes himself less exorbitantly. “I was an average student in and out of the classroom,” he says of his years at Ripon. “I didn’t excel in anything. I was just an average student.”

He played football for four years with the then-Redmen and still values the friendships he made during that time. “I think the fact that it was a small school helped you bond and make some lasting friendships,” he says. “The close-knit camaraderie of the school keeps that going. Some of my best friends are a handful of people I met while at Ripon.”

Benzel and his wife of 10 years, Wendy, an elementary schoolteacher, live in De Pere, Wis. r