Sprint Teams Up with NFL for Phone-Card Promo

Marketers at Sprint phone services took advantage of their official sponsorship of professional football by creating a program that attracts both phone-card users and trading-card collectors. The promotion, which features limited-edition versions of Sprint's Spree Foncard prepaid phone cards, seems to be scoring points -- the cards are expected to sell out before the football season ends. Helping that success are a variety of P-O-P pieces, including a life-size standee and a poster picturing three key NFL players.The promotion features a free, 10-minute prepaid phone card with each purchase of a $10 (31-minute) or $20 (62-minute) card. While the standard Spree cards retained their traditional graphic design, the additional card shows one of 12 popular NFL players on one side, similar to a trading card."We are capitalizing on two critical marketing dynamics: the growing popularity of prepaid cards and the power of Sprint's NFL sponsorship," says Marlene Waltz, director of prepaid cards at the Kansas City, Mo.-based telephone services company.The cards come shrink-wrapped together, with the standard card attached to a slightly larger card explaining how to use it. The NFL card is inserted loose in the sleeve on the other side of the instruction card with the NFL logo facing out.Cards are distributed evenly and randomly, so buyers don't know which NFL player they are buying. This eliminates the chase-card aspect that most trading cards use, Waltz notes, but retains the excitement of opening the package to see which player is inside. The list of featured players includes Brett Favre, Steve Young, Dan Marino, Drew Bledsoe, Marcus Allen, Troy Aikman, Barry Sanders, John Elway, Junior Seau, Kordell Stewart, Jerry Rice and Jim Harbaugh.The program kicked off in July when the cards began shipping to Sprint's key outlets, including convenience stores, college bookstores and gas stations. The promotion is supported by spot radio, local newspaper and "a full complement of P-O-P pieces" that accompany each retail order, Waltz says.That P-O-P array includes a 2-foot by 3-foot poster using the slogan "1st And 10," that shows three NFL players (Young, Marino and Allen) holding their own cards. Also featured is a 6-foot die-cut standee that likewise depicts the three players, in a life-size photo. The three players overlap each other vertically and hold large placards, which together say "Free 10 Minutes." Across the bottom of these P-O-P pieces are reproductions of some of the cards featured in the collection.These two key pieces are supported by shelf talkers, wobblers and mobiles. All of the P-O-P components were designed by the company's promotional agency, Berstein-Rein Inc., Kansas City, Mo., and produced by Printing Service Co., Dayton, Ohio.The NFL cards were promoted further in a campaign with General Mills, which touted the insertion of cards in randomly selected food products produced by the company.

Sprint Teams Up with NFL for Phone-Card Promo

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