Young Athletes Helping to Attract Older Fans

Baseball long has been Michael Mailman’s game. Not so for his sons Riley, 11, and Nick, 9, who are growing up with skateboards under their feet, which explains why the 42-year-old was standing in the middle of a big surfing and board-riding festival last weekend at the Huntington Beach Pier.

The Mailman boys went home happy after seeing their idols in action at the Bank of the West Beach Games. Dad found enough age-appropriate entertainment. And the festival’s corporate sponsors were happy to have both generations on hand to field their marketing pitches.

Action sports, including the 12th annual Summer X Games that will play out through Sunday at the Home Depot and Staples centers, remain focused on providing corporate sponsors and advertisers access to teenage males who seem immune to many advertising gambits.

“The X Games’ sweet spot obviously includes many [young] people who are just starting to formulate their brand choices,” said Mark Gibson, an advertising vice president with first-time X Games sponsor State Farm Insurance. “And, as they approach driving age, we want to find ways to connect, to make our brand relevant to them. And the X Games is one way for us to do it.”

But as more younger fans drag their parents to sports festivals and as action sports fans begin to age, surf/skate/snow festival operators are carefully trying to lure a broader demographic without alienating the youngsters who make the X Games, the Dew Tour and other contests of interest to advertisers.

“There’s always the concern that, as the sport grows in popularity, that you’ll take the edge away,” said Wade Martin, general manager of the Dew Tour, which hosts five major events that spin off more than 20 hours of television programming for NBC. “But if the nature of the sports -- the authenticity and heritage -- don’t change, then there’s nothing wrong with bringing more people along.”

So far, there’s little evidence that teenage males are upset by having to share some of action sports scene with their parents and younger siblings.

The X Games, which began in 1995 as a relatively minor event staged at two Rhode Island venues, now rank as the fourth favorite sporting event for teen-age males -- behind the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals and the World Series -- according to a survey completed late in 2004 by Chicago-based Teen Research Unlimited.

Last year’s Summer X Games programming on ESPN was the network’s highest-rated and most-viewed ever among teens, driven in large part by teenage males, a demographic that is of considerable interest to marketers -- and not only those pitching MP3 players, cellphones and fast food.

ESPN has enjoyed strong viewership gains among males from 19 to 49. Some of the older guys are late arrivals like Mailman who were introduced to board sports by their children.

“One of the interesting things we’ve seen in action sports in recent years is the complete role reversal in which kids are taking their parents to the game,” said X Games General Manager Chris Stiepock.

That generational phenomenon was evident at last year’s Boardfest in Huntington Beach, a Labor Day festival catering to mothers and daughters who view quality beach time the way other mother-daughter combos might treat shopping.

“We call them the stroller moms,” said Mike Kingsbury, executive producer of the Boardfest event.

But the biggest group of older fans are aging guys who like to watch the top pros -- including skateboarder Kevin Robinson, 33, whose toddler occasionally wears a shirt proclaiming that “my daddy rides better than your daddy.”

“The kid who was 13 years old when we first started this gig is 25 now,” Stiepock said. “He took his passion for action sports, and his desire to watch X Games to college and he’s now working in an office environment. Now he’s checking out the X Games with his 5-year-old son.”

The strollers were out in force at last weekend’s Bank of the West Beach Games.

Jeff Yost, 35, watched the surfing action while his wife, Stephanie, played in the sand with their toddler. The Irvine family also grabbed a bright red bandanna and a toy pair of binoculars handed out by sponsor Target -- a retail chain that the family regularly frequents.

“The beach is the great equalizer,” said Mary Borg, a regional manager for Bank of the West. “You don’t see as wide an array of generations at, say, a golf tournament. And that guy who looks like a kid at the beach can turn out to be a young businessman who’s making $50,000 or $100,000, and like any other consumer, he needs banking services.”

As the X Games moves further into its second decade, ESPN hopes to enjoy a continued expansion of its demographic sweet spot.

“Niche programming only takes you as far as that niche,” Stiepock said. “So when we do these broadcasts, we’re not speaking to an 11-year-old, and we’re not dumbing it down to a younger demographic. We’re speaking to the average ESPN viewer who respects all kinds of athletic competition.”