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MLS Loses Top Marketer to Yahoo!, Resets Sponsor Pact with Kellogg - Major League Soccer's Randy Bernstein - Brief ArticleTerry Lefton Major League Soccer's top marketing executive, Randy Bernstein, is leaving the 4-year-old league he helped build. Bernstein, the League's most tenured executive, who has also served as its evp and chief marketing officer, will join Yahoo! as vice president of sales promotions later this month.
In his new position, Bernstein will try to enhance the value of Yahoo!'s business partners in much the same way he helped build the value of soccer via sponsorships with AT&T, MasterCard, Bud and Pepsi-Cola.
"I'm feeling good about the fact that the league has credibility in the overall marketplace of sports properties and that we're in great shape heading into next season as far as corporate sponsorship" said Bernstein
Bernstein's departure continues an executive reshuffling of marketers that followed the hiring of NFL executive Don Garber as MLS commissioner in August. Since then, Dick Law who headed consumer products for MLS, has left to run Hicks Muse's soccer interests and sponsorship vp Kathy Carter departed for ISL.
"Randy has been a pillar as far as building the league," said Garber. AS for how he will reorganize marketing? "We've had a good sales organization, but now we need to be more marketing-oriented and make the brand more meaningful to youth and other key constituencies," said Garber. Look for him to split marketing and sales into separate jobs.
Separately the league has reupped a package with charter sponsor Kellogg, taking it up a notch to the top official sponsor level in a three-year, low seven-figure deal.
The pact gets Kellogg two TV-visible field boards at every MLS venue and their name on a team's jersey, likely the Dallas Burn, although its undecided whether a brand or the Kellogg name will appear. The company's youth grass-roots Cereal Bowl program will be expanded and two on-box promos are planned during the MLS season, which begins March 18.
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