Play 60 - Watching Football

I took this Sunday as a chance to do some homework on the NFL. My goal - watch a full day of NFL games and monitor the NFL's corporate social responsibility promotions. I know, this must have been tough. :)

Throughout the day, I counted 22 Play 60 commercials. I did not count the NFL-branded Play 60 items in the background or any comments from the announcers. My personal favorite Play 60 commercial:

So why does the NFL focus on Play 60? Is it the primary CSR effort?
Per the NFL's website, "NFL athletes grew up playing in communities all across America. Now, through NFL PLAY 60, they're encouraging kids in neighborhoods everywhere to come out to play for 60 minutes a day." This is not the only CSR effort undertaken by the NFL but it is their primary effort. It perfectly aligns with their strategy of growing the market and building the future NFL.

Thinking about it from two avenues - the players and the apparel - Play 60 builds the future NFL athletes by promoting young people to get out, exercise, and develop their bodies. Through the course of this, the NFL can get a football in the hands of the kids, or have their players visit and increase interest in the sport from a young age. Moreover, the Play 60 website has a nifty feature, which allows children to look at their local parks and find where NFL players and legends played. For a young kid, playing on the same field that NFL pro played on only helps increase the connection. Whether or not these children become future NFL players, the connection from the program will help grow the fan base. On a second more simple front this also promotes buying NFL apparel. Young people want to be their idols so that means they need to dress like their idols, from the shoes to the jerseys.

I think this perfectly aligns with their strategy and provides them with a more human element. Young children running around with a football without helmets is a lot more friendly than the traditional marketing of the NFL.

On a final note, I did not see one single mention of player health or concussion related advertisements. The NFL undoubtably does not want to highlight to its consumers the product they are viewing is basically destroying players' brains and bodies for the entertainment of others. It is socially irresponsible but not totally unethical because many of these players receive significant salaries over what they could make with just a college degree. Moreover, the NoMore organization ran 6 advertisements featuring NFL players who were taking a stand against domestic violence. It would be interesting to see if they NFL had provide funding or just the players for these spots.