New Britain Rock Cats ownership is taking a gamble moving its team from the Hardware City to Hartford, and it’s clear the success or failure of the relocation will rest in part on corporate community support.
Team owner Joshua Solomon is banking on drawing almost 200,000 more fans a year with a state-of-the-art stadium in the Capital City, but the opportunity to tap more deeply into the pockets of Hartford’s blue-chip companies, law, accounting and financial firms, and other businesses is a big part of the move’s allure.
For the Rock Cats to succeed in Hartford, the business community will not only need to provide sponsorship and advertising support but help grow the fan base. For years, the Rock Cats have generated a loyal following in New Britain by relying on families as its core customer base. That probably won’t change dramatically, but in order to boost annual attendance from around 307,000 to 500,000 the team will need to draw in downtown Hartford workers. That means making the franchise more appealing to professionals young and old.
To do that effectively Rock Cats’ ownership must get buy-in from the business community, so companies promote games to their workers and ante up tens of thousands of dollars or more to display their ads and logos within or on the stadium.
Solomon and his partners must convince the corporate community that the move to downtown Hartford will not only benefit the team, but the city as a whole. And they’ve got work to do. The fact that the deal was negotiated behind closed doors for 18 months, and then served to the public as a fait accompli in early June, has generated many unanswered questions.
For example, is a publicly-funded stadium the best use of real estate in the northern section of downtown? It’s a question top of mind to many Hartford companies, particularly those that are commercial property owners and who pay a disproportionate share of city taxes. Hartford’s difficulty in growing its tax base over the years is one of the major reasons it has fallen on tough economic times. Anytime the city commits land to public use we are forfeiting a potential opportunity to grow the grand list.
Yes, the hope is that a stadium at the intersection of Main and Trumbull streets spurs new development, but it’s not guaranteed. Ownership must offer a convincing vision for how their downtown presence will generate new commercial activity.
If businesses think the city is making a bad deal financing the team’s $60 million stadium, it will be harder to get their support. The sooner ownership wins over the business community, the greater chances their move here will succeed. So far, there has been little interaction. That needs to change quickly.
We urge ownership to embark on an aggressive informational campaign with the business community. Their move to the Capital City holds a lot of promise, but now we need more of the details of how this deal benefits the region as a whole.
