Instead of thinking about televisions as background noise, or simply a means to air a sporting event live, what if they could be used to enrich your customers’ experience instead?
“We’re getting a lot of inquiries from people asking ‘What else can we do with our TV screens?’” said Andrew Vickers, head of operations for Orange Door Music Video, a virtual DJ system featuring custom graphics and other visuals that help promote your venue internally through creative advertising—interspersed with music videos. In lieu of ads for national beverage brands, or depicting other national interests, the ads are specific to your business. “Especially for bars with 20 or 40 TVs, you can be a bit smarter with your TVs,” said Vickers. “TVs are one of the most important pieces of real estate in your bar.”
“You can’t fixate your TV screens around sports all day, every day. Sports becomes part of the wallpaper very quickly. If it’s not live sport, it fills the void and it’s just noise,” said Vickers, adding that 80 percent of the time there’s not a live sports game airing on a sports channel. This opens the door for possibilities on how to best utilize the televisions you already have. It also helps boost your bottom line.
For example, if you offer a weekly food special or happy-hour prices on certain days, or maybe this coming weekend you’re hosting a fun evening tied to the Kentucky Derby or another national event, why not promote those on your television screens? A patron may make plans to return. “When there’s no live sports on or it’s an ESPN rerun or a panel’s on, and it’s on mute and you have music on in the background,” said Vickers, “that’s really bad use of the TV screen.” All a bar or restaurant needs is an HDMI connection to put this type of custom programming provided by Orange Door Music Video into motion.
In addition to amping up the type of audio and visual content so it’s tailored to your customers, it’s important to not forget why most bars and restaurants have televisions in the first place: to air sporting games live. This social practice isn’t in decline—in fact, it’s more popular than ever before. So why not capture all of this interest and increase your customer base at the same time?
When Live Sports Drives the Business
Recently while in San Francisco, EverPass Media’s chief marketing officer Bryan Icenhower visited a bar airing a Manchester United match at 5 a.m. local time. The bar opened up early for 150 soccer fans. “I ended up staying for the entire match,” he said, noting the infectious energy in watching the match live with others. “Sports are better together. If you ask people for their favorite memory of a sporting event, it’s almost entirely something they went to at a stadium or at a bar or watch party. It’s rarely ‘I’m sitting on my couch.’”
Streaming these events extends will often extend the time people are at a bar or restaurant. They’re not just there for a drink or a meal. They’re visiting for a longer length of time. “You’ve got 20 million people watching an NFL game on Sunday,” said Icenhower. “That means anywhere from 2 million to 4 million of those people are out in restaurants.”
“Their primary job is to get food out in front of someone,” said Icenhower, about employees at bars and restaurants. “Now there’s that added complexity of ‘Where is the game on?’ and ‘Which channel do I need to go to?’ We started EverPass Media to aggregate all of that content into one streaming service for bars and restaurants.”
This way, staff isn’t flipping through channels or managing various subscriptions. Icenhower’s studied the shift in how and where other professional sporting events are aired today. They’re no longer just on local affiliates or on cable channels. “Over 50 percent of the nationally televised games were on streamers,” said Icenhower, about the most recent seasons for pro sports. “The F1 deal just switched from ESPN to Apple TV. You have NFL games that were on YouTube, Peacock, Paramount and Netflix last year.”
For no extra charge, venues can add Apple TV’s live-sports lineup—which includes Formula 1, Friday Night Baseball and MLS (Major League Soccer)—under the Core package offered by EverPass Media. And starting with the next NFL season, EverPass Media will be the only company offering NFL Sunday Ticket for businesses.
There’s also the added complication that streaming services are for residential non-commercial-use only, not for bars and restaurants. “You’re not even legally allowed to put them on TVs,” Icenhower said.
By carefully choosing how you’ll air these games, owners and managers of food and beverage establishments can get back to what matters and what they enjoy doing most: Serving customers and building their beverage and food program.