The untapped global potential of Gaelic games

Started by Eamonnca1, February 27, 2014, 06:49:40 PM

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neilthemac

#30
The GAA themselves need to market games to incoming tourists.

Have giant posters and video clips at the airports. Sponsor a plane belonging to see lingus and get the image if hurling on the outside of the plane!

The tourism chiefs in Ireland seem to be obsessed with golfing tourists and high spenders.
I mean pick up a lonely planet book on Ireland. One of the top things to do should be a GAA game, yet they are barely mentioned!


Ball Hopper


deiseach

The sample chapter is excellent. Looks like I'll have to hold back on commenting until after I've read the book!

thejuice

I've actually spotted a few tourist guide books that have hurling as one of the top things to see. I think Croke park is no. 1 on trip advisor.

I remember they had a GAA shop briefly in Dublin airport shopping area. It just had a load of jerseys and gloves, crocs and the like. Not much about the games at all so it was a bit of an oddity. Unless someone had been exposed to the games during their stay they were hardly likely to go in and buy something.

I wonder how well rugby and cricket would be doing globally without the help of British empire?
Perhaps we need to start conquering some indigenous tribes in Africa or the Brazilian rain forest and force them at gun point to be like us.

NFLs growth in Europe is largely down to a video game and tv exposure and lately great access for free of highlights and other coverage. It's all about exposure and making it easily accessible. I.e. Not on premier sports pay-per-view and restrictive Island of Ireland only web broadcasting.
It won't be the next manager but the one after that Meath will become competitive again - MO'D 2016

Jinxy

Quote from: Eamonnca1 on February 27, 2014, 10:09:38 PM
The rest of my answer was...

It was okay for the British to export their sports to the rest of the world, why is it not okay for us to do the same with ours?  We're renowned worldwide for our music, song, dance, literature, and our ability to drink, but our sports are unheard of. Even tourists that come to Ireland can go through a whole visit without being exposed to Gaelic games. It's almost like we're ashamed of them.  Why?

But by all means, buy the book!  Should be available within 24 hours.

Eamonn, I regularly watch your hurling and football videos on youtube where the rules are explained etc. and I always get a kick out of seeing the international reaction (particularly to hurling).
The one thing I was struck by recently however was how physically different hurlers and footballers look now, relative to the footage in those (excellent) videos.
Please feel free to tell me to F off but is there anything to be said for doing an updated version of one or both?
The general levels of athleticism now would probably shock a lot of those 'virgin' international fans.
If you could show them some of the Dublin-Kerry (football) or Cork-Dublin, Clare-Cork (hurling) action from last year in particular they would eat it up.
If you were any use you'd be playing.

AZOffaly


deiseach

It may seem obvious that the tourism authorities should be selling the native sports abroad, particularly the unusual and ancient one, and I recall Peter McKenna lamenting how Dublin was awash with Ryder Cup hoopla yet the sports that were bringing over 160,000 people to the capital in the same month were ignored by the city mandarins. But can you imagine the reaction from those for whom the GAA is the devil incarnate? No, any promotion of the GAA will have to be done by the GAA.

AZOffaly

Yes, but anyone can buy an advertising slot in the Airports. I think the GAA are at the very least missing a marketing trick here.

johnneycool

Quote from: AZOffaly on February 28, 2014, 12:09:10 PM
Yes, but anyone can buy an advertising slot in the Airports. I think the GAA are at the very least missing a marketing trick here.

The GAA marketing team are beyond useless.. They seem to leave it up to the sponsors to promote any events.

What would it cost to run buses from St Stephens green to Croke park after the parades are over and advertise it a bit?

The additional revenue at the gates would cover the cost.


Zulu

Appealing to tourists is one thing (and should be done) but there is a real possibility that the GAA can be a success internationally. I don't understand anyone asking why we would do it, there are no negatives to developing the GAA internationally - none. There are only positives and I can assure you if it was as easy to join a GAA club in many cities around the world as it is a soccer club then many of those lauding the games would actually play.

There are major issues in transferring interest in the games into active involvement and that is why it is far more important to get kids playing than it is to get the games widely exposed on TV, though that too is important. A well structured underage development plan with easier access to the games on TV would result in significant international growth.

An important point to remember is, we don't need to compete with soccer as an international sport, we should be aiming to get to the level of that rugby, basketball, hockey, net ball etc. are at* in many countries.

* I know rugby and basketball have a very high profile in some countries but in others they are reasonably popular while still being very much minority sports.

Eamonnca1


Eamonnca1

Quote from: thejuice on February 28, 2014, 10:22:11 AM
I wonder how well rugby and cricket would be doing globally without the help of British empire?
Perhaps we need to start conquering some indigenous tribes in Africa or the Brazilian rain forest and force them at gun point to be like us.

I used to think that was how British sports spread, but in researching for the book I discovered that oddly enough it's not quite how it happened. The British didn't conquer much of South America but soccer and rugby still made huge in-roads there. Ditto for the European continent.

Eamonnca1

Quote from: Jinxy on February 28, 2014, 10:28:52 AM
Please feel free to tell me to F off but is there anything to be said for doing an updated version of one or both?
The general levels of athleticism now would probably shock a lot of those 'virgin' international fans.
If you could show them some of the Dublin-Kerry (football) or Cork-Dublin, Clare-Cork (hurling) action from last year in particular they would eat it up.

I definitely need a better version of the football one.  It got so many negative comments (mostly from idiots complaining about the tune being on so many youtube videos, as if it's my fault they spend all day watching youtube) and from a lot of people actually saying they thought it looked like a stupid game. I never had that problem with the hurling video. Sad but true.  It bears out what I've always found, that hurling is an easier sell than football.

I did an updated hurling movie a few years ago, mainly because I wanted to get the pitch down to two minutes rather than five.  The reason is because from my youtube analytics it seems like audience attention has a tendency to drop off after two minutes, and when I was showing people the five-minute video on a handheld device I found myself skipping ahead a little to get to the point quicker. Also, the five-minute movie was made before anyone was viewing the web through mobile devices, and it turns out that the copyright restrictions on the soundtrack prevent it from being played on mobile, so I used a tune on the short version that I knew was going to be allowed on mobile platforms.  So nowadays I pass out the link to the two-minute movie instead of the five-minute one because something like 30% of its viewers are on mobile devices.

Zulu

QuoteIt bears out what I've always found, that hurling is an easier sell than football.

I've found the opposite myself.

Eamonnca1

There's advantages and disadvantages to both codes.  I find that hurling takes a bit longer to teach, but it's easier to get people interested in it.  Football is harder to promote, but it's easier for newcomers to pick up.  Maybe that's an American quirk.