Companies Hitch Their Products to Bands on the Rise

The band names--Bloo, Common Sense, Black-Eyed Peas and Freakuency Jones--aren’t on the tips of many tongues. But for a growing number of companies, up-and-coming bands represent an attractive method of blending music and marketing in order to move merchandise.

Such companies as Pacific Sunwear of California, O’Neill Sportswear, Levi Strauss & Co. and Jim Beam Brands Co. say it makes marketing sense to envelop their brands in the cool aura that hot bands can generate.

“It’s a natural relationship for a manufacturer, a retailer and a group that hits a very broad section of the youth market,” said Carol Apkarian , marketing director for Anaheim-based Pacific Sunwear, which is sponsoring a band on the upcoming Vans Warped Tour. “It’s really just a way of building a brand.”

The companies are betting that their investments will help to polish their images among younger consumers who take fashion and lifestyle cues from their favorite musicians. Big deals--Tommy Hilfiger’s recent sponsorship of the Rolling Stones--generate the headlines. But cutting-edge bands in towns around the country also have a cachet among dedicated fans.

“There are big bands out there like the Rolling Stones that everyone listens to, but smaller bands are a good marketing tool because people listen to music on a local basis,” said Shamus Hanlon, associate brand manager of Miller Brewing Co.’s Miller Genuine Draft, which incorporates leading-edge bands such as Garbage, the Cure and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy into its marketing.

San Francisco-based Levi’s is turning to up-and-coming bands to help to regain credibility among younger consumers. The company’s marketing deals often involve what Joe Townsend, Levi’s manager of music sponsorships, describes as “baby bands, the bands that might not be able to go out and tour the way they’d like to because of monetary restrictions.”

Black-Eyed Peas, a Los Angeles-based hip-hop group, is one beneficiary of Levi’s grass-roots marketing thrust. The band is now touring the country and has a second CD in the works. Said Townsend: “Our goal is to create associations with the music, and if we help these people out and make some great music, we all get the credit.”

Demographics are driving the collaborations that blend music, marketing and merchandise. Levi’s and Miller run separate programs that target Latinos and blacks. And in addition to its country and rock programs, Jim Beam offers grants to musicians, dancers and artists of every stripe.

Pacific Sunwear and O’Neill, which have agreed to sponsor a reggae band called Common Sense, are angling for free-spending teens who take their fashion cues from the music world. “That’s their market,” said Stephen Levy, who signs bands with Interscope records in Westwood. “All those kids that wear that clothing listen to this music.”

Marketers are betting that they can make inroads with younger consumers by associating with bands that, while still relatively unknown, offer an authenticity that music fans crave. Best Buy in March unveiled “Find Em First,” a program that promises to put new artists’ CDs on sale alongside established acts. Best Buy has promised to support newcomers with advertising on television and in print.

“The idea is to build relationships with a new band that you really feel is going to break through,” said Lisa Tenner, founder and executive director of EAT/M, a Las Vegas-based company that each year showcases hundreds of unsigned artists at a music festival. “That way, you’ve got the relationship built when they break into radio, retail and touring.”

Jim Beam and Miller draw criticism from some consumers for advertising that encourages drinking. But the companies are trying to strike a positive chord with consumers who are refining their tastes in alcoholic beverages. “Emerging artists sync up very well with our target consumer in their 20s,” said Alan Cohen, vice president of brand management for Deerfield, Ill.-based Jim Beam. “These programs help to keep our brand as relevant as possible among young adults.”

Companies declined to discuss financial aspects of their marketing deals, but Common Sense lead singer Nick Hernandez describes his deal with Pacific Sunwear and O’Neill as “not quite total red carpet . . . but it’s, like, totally good.”

After being dropped last year by Virgin Records, the reggae-influenced band that has sold fewer than 100,000 albums in the last seven years was scrambling to find funding needed to join the popular Vans Warped Tour.

The deal came together after Hernandez met with Pacific Sunwear, which was launching its first national advertising campaign. Irvine-based O’Neill subsequently jumped on board, lured in part by the fact that musician Hernandez also is a surfer and champion skim boarder.

The quid pro quo is what some artists describe as selling out: band members agree to help market their sponsor’s wares. Hernandez will don O’Neill apparel when Common Sense performs, and the band will play in a tent where Pacific Sunwear hosts fashion shows. The companies will also produce promotional CDs and run ads in Rolling Stone and Spin magazines.

But the marketing message can’t be delivered in big doses. Marketers use discrete signage in venues where their bands are playing. “You can’t use the hard sell,” said Jim Beam’s Cohen said. “We need to break through the clutter, but we don’t want to beat them over the head with our message.”

Jim Beam showcases local bands on interactive CDs distributed each month by Launch, a Santa Monica-based new-media company. Jim Beam also hosts live talent contests that offer country and rock bands an opportunity to audition with record industry executives.

“It’s not about slapping a bunch of Levi’s signs up there on stage,” said Levi’s Townsend. “If you ask me if a band is going to wear Levi’s on stage every night, well, that’s going to depend on how many times each week they wash their clothes.”

Warped Tour producer Kevin Lyman says the trend is toward more marketing deals. Five years ago, the Warped Tour was one of the few summer tours seeking sponsors. Said Lyman: “Vans got involved with Warped Tour during the second year and now everyone’s got their own sponsors.”

Marketing deals still ignite opposition from some corners.

Eric Ozenne, lead singer with the punk band The Nerve Agents, views corporate sponsorships as an affront to his music: “I just don’t think the whole commercial thing belongs in the music. All of a sudden bands become billboards.”

Hernandez sees it differently: “Everything just went together too perfectly,” he said. “It’s kind of a karma thing.”

Levi’s, which outfits bands that it sponsors, hasn’t run into resistance among artists. “The product we have is very much suited to the bands we’ve chosen,” Townsend said. “But, if you ask me if a band is going to wear Levi’s on stage every night, well, that’s going to depend on how many times each week they wash their clothes.”