When it was announced less than a year ago, the IPL or Indian Premier League was seen as a reactive move by the BCCI to counter Subhash Chandra's Indian Cricket League. Since then though with money pouring in - at last count nearly USD 2 billion, with star owners redefining hype and with city loyalties trying to outdo national loyalties - the IPL - is a whole new ball game. As its first tournament kicks off this week – CNBC-TV18 spoke exclusively to Lalit Modi, Chairman & Commissioner, IPL, Sandip Tarkas, President - Consumer Strategy, Future Group, R Balachandran, President & CMO, Reliance Retail, Digvijay Singh, CEO, Nimbus Communications with a ringside view to try and get the real picture.
Modi is confident of the tournament's success since the ticket sales are on track, advertising is on track and consumer response has been more than the organisers' expectations. Singh believes that the IPL is a great property. Though there would be anxiety and hesitation at the start, once the tournament gets rolling, things would fall into place well, he feels.
Excerpts from CNBC-TV18’s exclusive interview: Q: You have spent the better part of seven-months between defending the IPL and promoting the IPL. In the week that the IPL launches, is there any one fact that you can share that will silence your critics and there are many? Lalit Modi: There are many critics without doubt. But I think things have been going as planned and touchwood that we have actually no major calamity that we foresee. Ticket sales are on track. Advertising is on track. Consumer response has been more than what we could have expected. All that we have got to hope for now is that we have great games and we go forward with the right sprit.
R Balachandran: That’s right. Q: How are ticket sales looking? R Balachandran: We have just started… Q: You are going one match at a time? R Balachandran: We are starting go two matches at time because there is fairly short separation between the couple of matches and what viewers and followers of the game might know is that we are actually going to have matches in two different stadiums in Mumbai. One is Wankhade, which is pretty much the crucible of Indian cricket and the other is the brand new - the spanking new D.Y. Patil Stadium. Q: Which is in Navi Mumbai? R Balachandran: Yes, at Nerul - so what we are doing is - the first two matches, which are the respective matches in each location - tickets have just gone on sale for those. Interest starts peaking towards the last three or four days - that’s really what we expect will happen. Q: Some reporters or reports that are coming in from the ground at some of these stadiums across the eight cities say that its slightly “thanda”. One match at time, though we have been also speaking to the team ticket sellers and they are saying between 30-50% is what we can say as of today for match one - okay. Then you see in news reports Preity Zinta and Brett Lee autographing tickets - is that innovation or desperation? Sandip Tarkas: No, I think there has been some operational issues in the beginning. We are selling part of the tickets for the five of the teams and the tickets have just started selling from today and the response has been fairly decent. So I wouldn’t say its desperation.
Sandip Tarkas: Yes. Q: And five of the team and not all eight? Sandip Tarkas: Yes, not all eight. Q: So what is it you couldn’t stay away from - you are just vindicating everything Lalit goes out and bellows from the rooftops i.e. you cannot stay away from his IPL? Sandip Tarkas: We never stayed away from it intentionally. Q: He just wanted too much money? Do you think that Lalit Modi has been greedy because he has been making statements in public saying that - look Sony inventory sold out - look how much they paid - we should have charged more. He has been making statements like this. You think it’s going to be a case of the golden goose? Sandip Tarkas: I think those are strong words and can come from a journalist but I would … Q: But not from somebody who is seeing IPL tickets right? Sandip Tarkas: Yes. Q: What do you think are the challenges before the IPL? Q: Tarkas has made a point that while they are big supporters of cricket, they know the value it gets any advertiser, they were also not very sure that the valuations the IPL has touched is fair value at the moment. How do you react to that?
Q: Sorry, but you are sounding distinctly modest this week - is it because it is finally the week that the tournament takes off? It would be 5 years later because DLF is sitting tight on that spot now. Q: Neo has just seen South Africa- India series come to a close - would I be right in saying that IPL could suffer from some amount of cricket fatigue- what’s your take, don’t hedge? Q: Do you regret the fact that you don’t have the rights to this tournament?
Q: We talked about gate revenues and ticket collections earlier, I am surprised to see that none of the advertising, none of the communication that any of the teams have done is talking about the stadium experience, of getting to watch international players for 10 days in your city which normally if you look at calendar is once or twice or thrice a year? So why has that not been done? Q: So you are saying you got little time? Q: Your communication - the new commercial with Hrithik Roshan ends with the sentence, “Main bhi Indian bana chahata hoon”- you are not stressing city loyalties there are you? Balchandran: No, that is not quite true first of all what runs right through is the fact that it is the Mumbai Indians… Q: But you have the coolies and references to the Mumbai city which we can see in the commercial.. Balchandran: We have Sachin’s presence right through the film even though its on hoardings and it is still a very powerful presence and what is endearing about that commercial and what brings it close to people is the fact that people virtually see Mumbai in every frame. There is the spirit of Mumbai in every frame, visual shots of Mumbai in every frame. It is very difficult to look at the film and imagine any other city. Q: Then you are saying Mumbai spirit is the Indian spirit and therefore perhaps closer to national loyalties? Q: Are these eight stadiums ready to offer the kind of experience that these league matches household offer so that you get people coming into this stadiums and get these ticket collection and gate revenues that franchises are banking on? As far as ticket sales are concerned, they began in Kolkata and
Q: So merchandising is not going to be a big revenue stream in year one? Q: Have you got anything planned? Q: We have seen Nokia tie-up sponsor SRK’s team Knight Riders and there was a sense or we heard that that was perhaps the only team which was not linked through a corporate entity or any other service product brand and therefore would be best for a sponsor- which team do you think as a team a prospective team sponsor would find the most attractive? Q: Because of their corporate heritage or the ownership? Tarkas: No not really. Q: You don't see that as a problem. Singh: He is absolutely right when he says that the team which performs the best, will get the most support. But eventually between these eight teams, one team will win. That's still not the issue. There has to be a winner. The key challenge is, how the affiliation of the fan following with each team builds up and that has to buildup across all the teams because what we really need is for all the teams to be successful because if one team is hugely successful and seven teams flop badly, this is not going to be good news. Q: Also if one looks at the team names, is that they are all so based on the brands - not Mumbai Indians but Royal Challengers, Deccan Chargers, I mean these names personally I think lack imagination. Lalit what's your take on the names - let us get a creative perspective from you? Modi: I think they could have been more creative and taken into perspective the local flavours and the local areas. What they have done is basically leveraged some of their own brands from the ownership perspective.
Q: You have been fighting with the media by imposing a whole lot of rules and restrictions about what they can do and what they can’t do, you have got to admit that so far given how little time you have had to do genuine money based marketing it is really the media coverage that’s helped build the IPL property, isn’t it? Modi: It’s not that we are fighting with the media. We have just laid down the exact guideline as to what is allowed and not allowed. There were gray areas in the past and we wanted to make sure that there are no gray areas going forward. This is a new tournament, and we wanted everybody to be on the same page. I am glad to say that as of this evening we are all on the same page. Q: No news agencies boycotting IPL? Modi: PTI and INS has just made an announcement 10 minutes back that everything is fine in this series. Q: How are you going to evaluate whether or not IPL is a success? Are you going to look at the ratings it delivers? What is your parameter going to be? Singh: I guess the parameter is going to be whether I actually sit in front of the TV personally with my family and friends and see how my team is doing. If I develop that affiliation and association with the team, that it matters to me whether that team wins or loses. Q: To follow the tournament through to the final? Singh: The ratings will come automatically.
Q: Are you saying that’s the parameter you would use? Singh: That’s a personal parameter. On the professional parameter, it is a huge number of things. Essentially, what one would like to see is that there is a balance in terms of all teams doing well. Tarkas: On the numbers side, obviously ratings would be very important. I would also look at whether the hype is going to continue at the end of the league. Are people still going to look forward to the next game? There are lots of arguments for and against. Q: But there is a long gap between this April and next year. As Lalit Modi says there is only one IPL property every year? So, isn’t that going to come in the way of a sustained interest in IPL? Tarkas: It would and that’s exactly the point. The more successful leagues like the English Premier League gets played over eight months. We have talked about this point earlier and that is going to be the challenge. Q: How are you going to address this? Modi: We are not going to be able to address this in the first few years because we don’t have the luxury of fixed two hour programmes being changed. Q: And you have just made too many enemies in the world of cricket, isn’t it? If you increase the number? Modi: No, we don’t want to make enemies, we want everybody to be prospering with it. The objective is to have two seasons and we are going to move to two seasons. The second season we will try and move toward 2011-12. Q: How would you evaluate whether or not the IPL investments has worked for you? Balachandran: On a very qualitative level, the most important measure will be actually how much the team and franchise embeds itself with fans. That’s the critical thing because without that you cannot do a lot of things. That’s the real bedrock. Q: You think Mumbai Indians has put its best foot forward on that front? Balachandran: Absolutely. Q: You are lucky you don’t have all those big Australian names. The big key three-four names in the team are playing for just 10 days? Balachandran: We went at it in the auction with a certain strategy and even thereafter in picking the kind of talent. Time is going to tell whether the choice has been right. We have a very good feeling about it. We have a pretty fantastic mixture of the top international talent as well as some explosive Indian talent, young guys who are going to make their mark. That’s really what this tournament is going to be about, whether they are going to be able to establish themselves in the hearts and minds of fans because that’s how the foundation of a long run relationship is going to be there. Q: IPL is a year old, is it already a success? Modi: On the basis of revenue, we have no issues. Now, the issue is on stadium. We have the passion running all the way through in terms of fan following. Q: The statement that you made on eight team owners, did you receive any calls after that statement went public?
Modi: Nobody, I am waiting for somebody to come back.
Additional inputs from Network18’s Roma Khanna & Samidha Sharma:
If the first IPL match conjured up great expectations of full house, razzmatazz and blockbuster cricket then the inaugural game had all that and more. Bangalore’s packed Chinnaswamy Stadium saw home team Royal Challengers gave in with the Kolkata Knight Riders. While the Knight Riders got a boost from team owner Shahrukh Khan’s select cheer squad the losing team spirits haven’t being dampened. After all marketing spends held back the stadium and the opening match was the most anticipated and there is much more to come. Charu Sharma, CEO, Royal Challengers said,” What we certainly have early more time for the next few matches to engage the fans a lot more with fan zones as it were more fan marketing efforts more promotion around the state not just in Bangalore. Nothing, they worked already to a reason to the extent because we are the driver of an opening ceremony. The rest are very right are a little more challenge. But just in what we have seen today and adding to the fact that we have got a fair amount of season ticket sold I don’t think it is going to be a money mental problem.” Media planner’s say that on Day One Set Max was 70% full with spot buys going for anywhere between Rs 1.5 to 2 lakh for 10 seconds. For these rates to deliver return on investment (ROI), TV ratings will have to touch at least 3-4 TV hours. But all the marketing so far beat commercials featuring film stars or media interactions has all been focused on getting people into the stadiums. The Mumbai Indians who will host 10 matches this tournament while the other cities get seven each has roped in Hrithik Roshan to back it’s marketing effort. It’s optimistic that it will deliver the crowds. R Balachandran said, “We have, I believe, a pretty fantastic mixture of the top international talent as well as some explosive Indian talent young guys who are going to make their mark that’s really what this tournament is going to be about.” |
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In the last seven months, these are the facts and figures that have dominated our perception of IPL: 8 teams auctioned for USD 720 million and 78 players have racked in over USD 40 million. Sony has won the media rights to telecast the IPL for over USD 1 billion over ten years.
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