Friday, November 12, 1999
Stadium to carry 5/3 name
Move boosts its visibility in Dayton
BY JEFF McKINNEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Flexing its muscle in Montgomery County, Fifth Third Bank hopes to score big at the new $23 million stadium for the Dayton Dragons minor-league baseball team.
The Cincinnati-based bank, which become Dayton's largest by acquiring the city's last independently owned bank two years ago, said Thursday that it bought naming rights at the stadium.
The 8,000-seat park will be known as Fifth Third Field.
The deal between Fifth Third and the Dragons will boost the bank's visibility in Dayton, continue its commitment to downtown development and allow it to serve potentially thousands more consumers.
The agreement also marks the first time Fifth Third has ventured into the naming rights game for a sports complex. It raises the question of whether the $41 billion bank could become a bidder on naming rights for the new Cincin nati Reds stadium, set to open in 2003.
The Reds' agreement with Hamilton County allows the team to sell naming rights for the new ballpark. The Reds have the option of using that money to help pay the team's $30 million contribution to the ballpark project, estimated to cost $299 million.
But a sports marketing expert said the likelihood of Fifth Third bidding is nil, because a company would opt first for a major league complex instead of a minor-league facility and because of the close proximity of Cincinnati and Dayton.
“It would be unnecessary overkill and make naming rights on the minor-league field valueless,” said Dean Bonham, chairman of The Bonham Group, a Denver-based sports marketing and consulting firm.
Neither Fifth Third nor the Dragons would disclose financial details of the agreement, other than saying the deal calls for Fifth Third to have naming rights for 20 years.
Typically, depending on the size of the market and promotions tied to the center, naming rights for such a structure could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, industry analysts say.
Mr. Bonham estimated that a bidder might pay $200,000
to $500,000 a year, including getting rights to interior and exterior signs, radio and TV spots and name included on field-related literature.
Fifth Third executives said they're paying in the “middle-range” for the rights, but would not elaborate. But Eric Deutsch, a Dragons spokesman, said Fifth Third won the rights after the team took bids from five or six Dayton companies interested in the site.
The confirmation of naming rights ended months of speculation that Fifth Third was negotiating a deal with the Dayton Dragons, the Class A affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds.
Mr. Deutsch said team officials looked at more than just money — a long-term commitment to Dayton was an important factor.
“They're trying to become Dayton's hometown bank, and they're making this commitment to distin guish themselves as that,” he said.
Fifth Third became Dayton's largest bank and mortgage lender in mid-1998, when it paid $740 million in stock to buy the parent of Citizens Federal Savings Bank. The deal also made Dayton Fifth Third's second-largest Ohio market, behind Cincinnati.
Today, Fifth Third Bank of Western Ohio, which serves a 12-county area anchored by Montgomery County, has assets of about $5 billion and deposits of $4 billion and serves about 214,000 households.
The bank also will have a chance to reach more customers with naming rights at the new minor-league ballpark. The Dayton Dragons estimated the team's annual attendance at 500,000 to 600,000.
About 44 percent of the seats in the stadium have been sold, and the Dragons will begin play in April.
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