Steve Feuerstein (00:02.487)
What a pleasure, Dave Hamlet, Vice President of Sponsorships and Social Media at Prudential Financial. I'm gonna do that one more time. What a pleasure, Dave Hamlet, Vice President of Sponsorships and Social Media at Prudential Financial. What a real pleasure it is to have you on the Transaction Report.

Dave Hamlett (00:24.034)
Thanks Steve, happy to be here and looking forward to diving in.

Steve Feuerstein (00:28.247)
So you got a hefty title. You've been in the industry a long time. You were at several organizations and financial services, insurance, banking, where you had serious expertise in the area of sport. I want to start, and I've always looked fondly at those who have great encasements of sports memorabilia. And you have, you certainly have a shrine behind you, Dave.

Dave Hamlett (00:54.712)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (00:55.191)
Let's see if we can turn this into a business experience together. You have a passion for sport. First of all, define, if you will, the passion you have. What is the passion you feel toward the memorabilia behind you?

Dave Hamlett (01:09.098)
Absolutely. the memorabilia behind me is really special to me because not only is it kind of a shrine to the work that I've done, but it's also a shrine to the things that I'm passionate about. So the one image on the wall behind me is from the Masters. I had actually attended the Masters that year and I'm a huge golf fan. I play golf myself and we'll get into this, but I do a lot of work with Rutgers University. You can see a Rutgers University basketball back there. I went to Rutgers undergraduate and graduate. My Twitter handle is actually Rutgers Dave. So yes, there's definitely

a passion that has grown in me from a young age, just being a sports fan growing up. And I always had a dream of how amazing would it be to work in sports marketing. And yeah, here I am today and doing some amazing things that are close to my heart, whether it's Rutgers, working in golf, obviously the New Jersey Devils and the Parental Center. So yeah, it's, and I definitely like to keep track in some mementos from all of those experiences.

Steve Feuerstein (02:05.237)
You know, so let's see if we can, when you look at it and detach yourself from your professional experience as a sponsorship expert, and you are a sponsorship expert, you make weighty decisions in vast amount of properties and athlete, you're involved in so many aspects of sports sponsorship and trying to really engender the prudential financial institution as an entity that has a relationship with

with customers, target markets, have a, just a straight placement of an advertisement, this connection to your brand, because they feel you care about their passions. So let me go again to what you see behind you. When you look at a personal passion you have, the Rutgers memorabilia, if you will, or the Masters, as you said, let me use the Masters if we

You went to the Masters, there is no title sponsor of the Masters. So perhaps the greatest identity the Masters have is besides its distinct colors of identity, its logo, is certainly the name Augusta. So what is it about you as a fan that you relate to the Masters in a way that the sponsors behind the Masters who are not

Dave Hamlett (03:09.942)
Very true.

Dave Hamlett (03:20.396)
little

Steve Feuerstein (03:33.725)
again recognizable by a title name, the way the Prudential Center is, where you're the title of such a recognized venue. Let's go right into that and tell me if you will, first of all, do you recall any of the sponsors of the Masters?

Dave Hamlett (03:49.262)
Yes, there's, as I think through it, actually no, you know what Steve? No, I don't. When you think of the folks at the Masters, you think of the hospitality offerings and like Berkman's Place and the new map and flag. There are sponsors behind those, but no, I actually don't off the top of my head recall who they are. Yeah, that's right.

Steve Feuerstein (04:13.121)
So it's really interesting. IBM has touted its relationship with the Masters just because of the technology they provide for the organization. I'm really going to enjoy this conversation together with you because we can see and expose areas of sponsorship. On the one hand, that's going to be absolutely earth shattering in its value proposition. On the other hand,

Dave Hamlett (04:21.026)
Right.

Steve Feuerstein (04:41.141)
We're also gonna experience sports sponsorship from a level of, did it really impact the intended target market? Did it transcend VIP corporate hospitality? So I had started with first and foremost, and we're gonna kind of go back and forth. For the moment, let's go back from the masters to the memorabilia.

Dave Hamlett (04:51.543)
Absolutely.

Dave Hamlett (05:00.799)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (05:06.349)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (05:07.553)
Do you feel connected above and beyond the school Rutgers? So that's a title sponsorship, if you will. It's Rutgers University, and you got the big R there. You went to undergrad and grad there. Is there anything that speaks to you commercially about the memorabilia behind your back?

Dave Hamlett (05:24.174)
mean, for me professionally, in the last couple of years, I feel like I've become even more connected to my school. I've always been connected. Not only am I an undergrad, graduate, alumni of Rutgers University, I'm also a passionate fan of their sports programs. I'm an 18 -year season ticket holder in football. I go to as many basketball games as I can get to. We're very excited about the basketball season that's upcoming, by the way, and football's looking pretty good as well. But...

My profession has allowed me to get even closer to the university, which is one of the things that I love the most. We are the title sponsor of Rutgers Men's and Women's Basketball. This started last year, I think, I'd like to actually say we're one of the first major corporations that has sponsored an actual season, like a team. We're sponsoring. Yeah, we are the title sponsor of Rutgers Men's and Women's Basketball. the seed. So if you go to a Rutgers basketball game.

Steve Feuerstein (06:08.732)
Can you define that title sponsorship, please?

Steve Feuerstein (06:14.391)
How does that reflect itself, please?

Dave Hamlett (06:19.33)
You go inside the arena, Prudential is everywhere. You'll see us there. But as I mentioned to you, Steve, when we were talking before, for us, it's always about how do we go beyond slapping a logo? So yes, Prudential is everywhere inside of Jersey Mike's Arena. However, we take full advantage with our businesses of all the hospitality opportunities that are afforded to us as a result of the sponsorship. But more importantly, we wanted to make sure that we were making a difference with the student athletes.

So I'm actually getting my financial advisors at Prudential in front of the women's basketball team, the men's basketball team. In addition to some other sports as well, just by association with us working with Rutgers, the volleyball team, the baseball team, so on and so forth. And we're actually getting in front of these student athletes and we're actually teaching them about financial literacy so that they understand that once they're done, whether they go to the pros or they go into their professional careers in business, for example,

We're trying to lay the foundation, lay the groundwork so that they're better prepared to do that. And we are doing that with some NIL deals with the student athletes as well to kind of get them prepared, but they're not standard cut a check and handed to them. We're actually funding brokerage accounts to get them an understanding of what it's like to actually invest some funds and watch it grow and get ready for their retirement and protecting their lives of work down the road. that's to us is important to make sure we're really making it.

Steve Feuerstein (07:38.195)
So, Dave, there will be those who will ask, first and foremost, it's wonderful to support a particular athlete with this literacy, a team with the literacy. What is the extension that goes beyond the few because you are a relatively mass market organ, while you have a specific, at least as I learned, a target market where you were very much focused on

a core market that I believe was somewhere around the 34 to 50 -ish, at least the research that we came across was a 35 to 64 household income over 100 ,000. Your sense of how going at the college level athlete, how it impacts your core target market, which could be suggested on average to be 20 years older than that?

Dave Hamlett (08:35.202)
Yeah, well, our thinking is it is an exception, for sure. That's a good point, Steve. It is an exception. However, our thought is these athletes, well, they're gonna be on our target market at some point. So the idea is to try to get ourselves in front of them at an earlier point in their lives so that they are primed to do business with us. So that's certainly important. But the other part of it too, when I say it's a little bit of an exception, is we're working with our state university here and Prudential has some longstanding ties with Rutgers University. So it also is about

even if they don't quite hit our target market, they certainly are important to us just in terms of helping our state university and helping those students really move on to that next level.

Steve Feuerstein (09:14.999)
You know, it's only in prep for the show and I'm from New York, Dave. And I have to tell you, because of you, I learned, and I used to be a lacrosse player. So I used to go to, in fact, I went to Rutgers, I haven't thought of this in decades. I went to Rutgers lacrosse camp back, and I have to tell you, it must've been around 1977. And I was a goalie. And I can tell you to this day until meeting you, I had no idea.

Dave Hamlett (09:23.095)
Okay.

Dave Hamlett (09:30.616)
Okay.

Dave Hamlett (09:37.323)
it.

Steve Feuerstein (09:43.743)
Rutgers University is actually the state university of New Jersey. Yeah, I always saw it as just an institution no distinct from any other non -state university. And with your headquarter, obviously, you're in Newark, correct? Yeah. So I'm so interested in how we extend from the few to the many. Because sponsorship is an investment.

Dave Hamlett (09:47.726)
yeah, yeah, yes.

Dave Hamlett (09:58.936)
Yes, yes, yes.

Dave Hamlett (10:05.774)
Thank

Dave Hamlett (10:09.336)
the window.

Steve Feuerstein (10:13.06)
Is it fair to say that collectively in the men's and women's team with your NIL behind it, is the NIL primarily basketball?

Dave Hamlett (10:20.408)
No, I would say it's focused very much on basketball, but we've extended it out to a few other sports. We're hitting, as I mentioned earlier, volleyball, baseball. We work very closely with the folks at Rutgers to see who we can, and I wish we could do it for everyone, but obviously all corporations have budgets. So we definitely work with the folks at Rutgers and we've hit basketball, obviously both men's women's basketball teams, the volleyball team, the baseball team as well.

Steve Feuerstein (10:47.639)
So is it fair to say, and again, these numbers, particularly when you're looking at March Madness, for example, I mean, you look at just the broadcasting rights generated for Turner and for its partner, you're looking at 1 .2 billion annual revenues generated, just actually that they pay rather to the NCAA in their last contract negotiation. It's an expensive undertaking, depending on what level of sport.

Dave Hamlett (11:03.678)
yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (11:16.339)
one gains entry. If you look at Rutgers, and let's just take that as a model, and we're gonna go back, I haven't forgotten about the Masters, so we're gonna hit the Masters again together, but if we look at Rutgers, is it fair to say, activation, rights fees, you might be all in as an organization, over a million dollars a year?

Dave Hamlett (11:37.23)
to be honest with you. Yeah, with activation. are, it's not very much, not a lot, but we're definitely under, we're definitely under. Yeah, Ruckers has been great partners and in terms of the activations that we do, yeah, it's just a tad underneath, but it's worked really well for us and yeah, so.

Steve Feuerstein (11:38.839)
Okay, with activation.

Steve Feuerstein (11:45.823)
Hehehehe.

Steve Feuerstein (12:00.031)
So the sports concept of going at a team, and it makes total sense. mean, we both know that credit card companies obviously will target as youthful as they can get to educate, to school, banks, you know, our variant. It makes total sense to go with the younger demographic. Frankly, when I saw the demographic listed by one of your former colleagues in an article from a few years back, I went, wow, I didn't realize.

The demographic was a 34 to a plus 50 core demographic. So it makes sense. How do we, when we go in, you sit with your C -suite and they say, Dave, you are involved in so many sponsorships. Some of those are legacy that you inherited coming into the position. And obviously you're making your own mark, which we'll talk about momentarily about how you make those decisions. But when they ask you about how do we understand

the value generated. I don't wanna say ROI. I wanna stick with the concept of value generated. Let's take the microcosm, because it is one of your, at least from what I have seen, one of your more localized sponsorships or state -oriented sponsorships. You have global sponsorships that you're involved in. How do you speak to a CMO or a CFO or a CEO?

and itemize for people who want a quick high -level assessment the value the organization is getting for let's just call it whatever dollar amount you're putting in. And for the moment, we'll call it a 850, $900 ,000 investment. And how would you speak to them to represent this was an optimal choice for the brand?

Dave Hamlett (13:48.864)
Absolutely. and as you said, Steve, value. I mean, for me, there's definitely different definitions of value. There's the dollar for dollar spend and what the multiple is on that that we're getting as a result of it. There's certainly the media exposure across and the idea, you know, we were also, you know, playing a little bit of a bet here when we signed the deal over a year ago, knowing Rutgers is going to have one of the top recruiting classes in the country, you know, that that was going to help Prudential as well because there's going to be even more exposure.

for the brand coming out of that. So first and foremost, it's certainly the exposure that the brand is gonna get across all the major teams that are coming into Jersey Mike's arena to play the team. Rutgers is now flying across the country. They're gonna be playing USC and Oregon, you name it. So there's exposure. We're now gonna be bringing Rutgers and the fans that are watching those teams coming to Jersey Mike's on TV. They're gonna see Prudential everywhere. So there certainly was the brand exposure. That's one piece, but that's not enough.

Steve Feuerstein (14:40.087)
Could you give our viewers an understanding, because you've referenced Jersey Mikes many, many times. And Prudential as a title sponsor, true title sponsor of a venue, where we are gonna meet, well, why don't we meet over at the Prudential Center? Or where's the game? at the Prudential Center. Where's the concert? It's at Prudential Center. Where's the political event? Where's the community event? Et cetera, et cetera. It's all at the Prudential Center.

Dave Hamlett (14:44.664)
your understanding.

Dave Hamlett (14:54.422)
yeah.

Dave Hamlett (14:58.563)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (15:09.617)
As a non -title, I know you mentioned you're all over. Could we get specific, first and foremost, of how does that compare to a Jersey Mike's or other sponsors? Can you first of all delineate that for all of us here?

Dave Hamlett (15:26.22)
You mean the venue Jersey Mike's?

Steve Feuerstein (15:28.096)
So you said you, the prudential financial are everywhere. Whereas an institution, everybody sees us. What does that mean? If I go to a game, a Rutgers men's basketball game.

Dave Hamlett (15:38.07)
yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I got you Steve. So when you walk inside a Jersey Mike's arena, the folks at Rutgers might slap me on the wrist for saying this, a lot of people still refer to it as the rack as Steve when you were there for lacrosse. It was the rack back then, but you know, it's Jersey Mike's. And so when you walk inside Jersey Mike's arena and you approach the court, prudential signage is everywhere. And that's a testament to the great partnership that we've had with the team at Rutgers. So when the guys are shooting free throws during the games, there's a gigantic prudential sign.

on the wall behind the backboard. We have wonderful LED work that's been done by my own in -house creative team that plays throughout the course of the games, where we have straight brand messages and we even have right down to business specific messages that are playing. So if you're sitting inside a Jersey Mike's Arena, you're not missing Prudential. And then if you're watching on TV and a game is being played at Jersey Mike's Arena, the Scorer's Table, the LED on the Scorer's Table, it has a persistent Prudential board on it.

And we were able to work very closely with Rutgers to say, where can we get the logo exposure that is going to be most TV visible? So we have it there. So that's great. And one other thing I do want to mention that I think Rutgers has been amazing with was they also allowed us, even though we're the title sponsor of Rutgers Men's Women's Basketball, because we're a partner in the athletics organization now as a result of that sponsorship, they gave us signage inside of SHI Stadium where the football team plays.

So if you go to the football games, and that actually rolled out last year when Rutgers played Northwestern on the first game of the season and it was broadcast live. It was the only game in town the night that game was broadcast. And so that was very attractive for us because it had a national audience watching and saw us. So LEDs everywhere, there's signage on the field on the LEDs that are behind the goal posts. So that to me is saying that if you're watching, you're not missing potential because we definitely are everywhere.

That's a testament.

Steve Feuerstein (17:32.917)
The experiential side, as you said, again, vital, important, critical to have the logo experience. It's important to try to gain the share of mind from the optics of what people are viewing. And with placement and messaging, that can be easy to read, legible, non -cluttered, share of screen dominant, and having these critical path variables.

that clearly you're meeting in how you've approached this with the team at Rutgers. We know that based on our conversation about the Masters and some other golf tournaments that we can show up at events and we can watch very sterling level events and walk out and be so focused on the competition that without some type of experiential, we may not have achieved what

perhaps the intent was. Experientially, how do you go about making a decision about we've got this property, we're involved visually, what's that, we have our financial advisors meeting with team members and NIL endorsement deal, sponsorship deal relationships. What else would we expect a prudential financial to do to maximize

Dave Hamlett (18:51.522)
Yes.

Steve Feuerstein (19:00.021)
that on court TV exposure live spectator experience.

Dave Hamlett (19:04.494)
Yeah, yeah, 100%. And that's through experiential for sure. And I like to say I have one of the best experiential teams going. They do an amazing job. So I'll use Rutgers as an example. Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (19:14.784)
Can I ask you, Dave, just to interject there, what constitutes an outstanding experiential team?

Dave Hamlett (19:20.504)
Somebody who has an eye for creating truly memorable, breathtaking experiences. Activation, experiential activation. So whether it's like you're at Rutgers, I can give you an example. We were at Rutgers last weekend, activating an event called The Walk to Believe, which is part of our sponsorship work. And that's with Eric LeGrand, who was a very well -known former Rutgers University basketball player, I'm sorry, football player, who was paralyzed in a game over a decade ago.

Steve Feuerstein (19:25.715)
experiences being defined as.

Dave Hamlett (19:49.022)
and he is still very much involved with the Rutgers community. He is out in the forefront for spinal cord research and he had his Walk to Believe in partnership with the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation last weekend at the Rutgers -Acrin game. Prudential was right there at the forefront activating on what we call the Boardwalk at Rutgers. Think of New Jersey, of course you have to think of a Boardwalk. So all the fans coming down on the Boardwalk to head into SHI Stadium came right past our activation which...

was to bring in the masses to teach them a little bit about what's going on in Prudential with our most current campaign, Protect Your Life's Work, that was at the forefront. We had everything there for the kids from mini golf to giveaways, we had cooling towels, so it's really about endearing Prudential to the masses that are coming in. So experiential activation is a very important part of it, because I know I mentioned earlier, Steve, we don't ever just want to slap a logo and say this is gonna work, because it's not gonna work. So, yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (20:44.471)
So would the goal, I know that your first logo in the 18, if I remember correctly, it was the 1860s that the rock of Gibraltar was chosen as your symbol, the iconic symbol of prudential. And the first slogan was the prudence, prudence has, was it prudence has the strength of Gibraltar, prudence. So you got prudential.

Dave Hamlett (21:13.602)
Yup.

Steve Feuerstein (21:14.391)
And Prudence has the strength of Gibraltar. When you look at, again, these messages of protect your life's work and looking at your iconic identity that's lasting, and I remember it from my childhood to this day, it's an iconic identity of a brand. How vital is it to you to message this sense of

Dave Hamlett (21:17.964)
Yep.

Dave Hamlett (21:31.8)
Yep.

Steve Feuerstein (21:43.489)
You know, we are the rock of Gibraltar, right? It's a metaphor as well, which is a beautiful concept, which I haven't ever associated with your brand, but it is so beautiful of a seductive message that you have this iconic identity as the rock of Gibraltar. We talk about people who are so strong and reliable and steady in the face of adversity as being a rock of Gibraltar. And yet at the same time, I want to parallel that with the reference about protect your life's work.

Do you have the task before you to make sure to emphasize that you are this steady, eddy, reliable, totally bankable identity? You can always rely on us as the rock. And then if you do, how do you communicate that above and beyond the visual? And then how do you integrate, protect your life's work concurrently? How do you do a message?

Dave Hamlett (22:15.65)
it.

Dave Hamlett (22:41.71)
Yeah, that's great. Yes, I would say certainly, yes, we are, it is important to us to say that we are this foundational, steady, rock -solid presence. We are going to have our 150th anniversary in February of 2025. So Prudential is, we've been around a long time, but at the same time, we want people to know that one of the things that we leverage sponsorships for as well is to kind of continue to endear ourselves to the masses because

Yes, we've been around 150 years, but that's a long time. We wanna show people that we're kinda keeping up with the times as well, and that we're getting ourselves out in front of audiences in a more, I always like to say, we like to deliver experiences that have people walk away saying, I did not expect that from Prudential. So that's very important to us. So I would say that that's how we come up with the properties that we're involved in, whether it's Rutgers, whether it's, we could talk more later on about the Rose Bowl or the Bobble Rock Music Festival in Napa Valley. These are things that people,

We're endearing ourselves to the masses, hitting our targets squarely, but having them walk away saying, I did not expect that from Prudential. This is amazing. Because a lot of people think of us, we always joke around like, we've been around 150 years ago when people were selling life insurance door to door. So yeah, so it's very much about taking these properties and making sure that people understand that we are the rock solid foundation, but we're also endearing them in a way that they may not have expected us to be. Like we're appearing in areas where they may not have expected us.

Steve Feuerstein (24:07.191)
When you look at the marketing mix and you look at your decision making about sponsorship versus other, let's just call it opportunity cost, you're both social media and sponsorship. Those are not mutually exclusive. Obviously you engage social media in all aspects of your sponsorship. But when I first got involved in the industry in 1990 as an owner of events, professional sports events, from golf to ATP and WTA tennis,

Dave Hamlett (24:22.926)
yes.

Steve Feuerstein (24:35.383)
pro volleyball globally, et cetera, et cetera. When you look at the opportunity to place money elsewhere, obviously legacy media was for the breadth of a long time, all we had. And we started to realize that, you know what, opening up a Businessweek magazine when it was at its prime and seeing seven automotive ads isn't really great for any of those automotive manufacturers. It starts to look pretty repetitive.

Dave Hamlett (24:51.288)
Yep.

Steve Feuerstein (25:05.227)
How many times can you say, go to this speed, this fast, in this many seconds, or we have a sexy model, modeling the particular demoing the car, and they start to look alike. And sponsorship came in and said, you know what, we can reach your consumer and their passions in a way that you can stand out exclusive and unique. With your approach to sponsorship,

And again, going beyond just logo at venue. What else do you do beyond the social experience, the experiential, you know, aspect of extracting as much as you can to properly maximize the investment? VIP corporate hospitality, would you, could you give a percentage, if you will, as to how important that is to you as a brand in the breadth of your sponsorships?

Dave Hamlett (26:02.19)
Yes, absolutely. It's extremely important. I was just using corporate hospitality as an example, it's probably 50 % of the game in some of the areas that we play in. Like I'll talk about the Rose Bowl, for example. One thing I do want to touch on, Steve, you bring up a good point though, how do you make the decision to transition money to sponsorships versus media? I will say this, we are set up beautifully inside of Prudential where under my boss, who was Richard Parkinson, the chief brand officer for Prudential,

Steve Feuerstein (26:16.097)
Please.

Dave Hamlett (26:29.792)
Under him is also the head of media, the head of brand, the folks who are making our amazing commercials and being the stewards of the brand. We all work so closely together that I couldn't do, like I feel like we couldn't do what we do without having the great partnership across each other. So I can easily tap my media partners to help us evaluate certain aspects of sponsorship opportunities. And same thing with the brand team, as we're bringing things to light in sponsorship areas, like I can tap the brand team to say, is this keeping in line with the way that we're trying to take the brand in certain advertising areas and so on and so forth.

having my peers next to me in those specific areas, I will say that sponsorship is not a silo. We need to be able to partner effectively with each other across these areas to get the maximum, maximum, maximum benefit. So I will say that, but that's an aside. Back to what I was saying, Steve, with corporate hospitality, for example, and yeah, as I mentioned, it goes so far beyond just the logo slapping. So when we say corporate hospitality,

There's other touch points with clients that aren't just experiential. mean, I'll also say whenever I launch a new sponsorship, and I'll go back to corporate hospitality, but whenever I launch a sponsorship, I'll also say, can I leverage the beauty and the power of these assets to touch my consumer base in a way that is going to excite them? So I'll just give you a couple of quick examples. Rutgers basketball. I am now going to be running a sweepstakes featuring some of the

Best players on the team. We have two of the top players in the country on the Rutgers men's basketball team, Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper. We're featuring them in a sweepstakes that we're gonna be running. Sending it out to Rutgers nation on behalf of Prudential saying, win an opportunity to attend a big 10 basketball game and the best seats to offer inside of Jersey Mikes, the Loge box seats, fully equipped with food and beverage. So that's another way. And obviously from a business standpoint, as you know, those are leads back into our company that are being generated from.

the folks that are entering the sweepstakes. there's a win -win on both sides. We're helping the fans get access to something. It's gonna be one of the hottest tickets in college basketball this year is getting into that arena. So we're helping them do that. Same thing with the Rose Bowl. The Rose Bowl, we run a sweepstakes. We ran a wonderful sweepstakes last year at the Rose Bowl where folks could enter for a chance to win a trip to the national championship. So we were activating that both online and in person. So we were doing digital marketing, promoting that sweepstakes, but at the same time,

Dave Hamlett (28:45.676)
people that were at the FanFest for the Rose Bowl last year were interacting with Prudential with a wonderful Rose Bowl logo photo opportunity. We were giving away some swag and giving them a chance to enter. So I would say those things are important. are still experiential reaching the customers. But that to me is important to get the benefit back to the business in terms of leads and prospects and things of that sort. Now back to... Yep.

Steve Feuerstein (29:09.323)
Dave, just before we jump, because you made a great point about your media team and how you collaborate under the leadership of your chief brand officer. And I am curious, do you have any policy protocol that says when you're sponsoring, for example, the Rose Bowl, we are going to be allocating X percent of this budget to straight.

advertisement placement behind the game, or for example, the Rutgers men's and women's basketball teams, when they air, Prudential is going to be seen not only on court, but we're going to be then able to articulate a product message, product feature message. Is there any written in stone, or I should say written in rock that you actually have as policy at the corporation?

Dave Hamlett (29:59.054)
I like what you did there, written in rock. No, there's nothing that I would say is like a codified, have to hit, strict policy, but that's the wonderful thing about the partners that I have. They're so amazing at what they do that we can figure out what the sweet spot is for those things if we're doing a Rose Bowl sponsorship. And obviously with a Rose Bowl sponsorship, you have your media partners externally that you're working with at Disney and ESPN, so there's gonna be media thresholds that have to be hit anyway.

But as we're evaluating other sponsorships too, there's media opportunities. We can kind of like work together to pull those levers up and down as needed to figure out what the right mix of media versus onsite is and so on and so forth. the good, I we don't have, I actually think it's a really good thing that we don't have like a set in stone has to be a certain way because we can kind of tweak it to arrive at an area that like hits that sweet spot and is most beneficial for us.

Steve Feuerstein (30:50.487)
Do you find that much of your sponsorship will have visibility through commercial time? There will be a straight buy.

Dave Hamlett (30:56.706)
Yes. So there is not for all of them though. So for example, the Rose Bowl, absolutely we run multiple spots during the Rose Bowl. But then there's other ones where there isn't like one of the biggest sponsorships we did back Memorial Day weekend was with Live Nation, Bottle Rock Music Festival, Napa Valley, California with some of the best acts across music. Night one was Stevie Nicks, night two was Pearl Jam, night three was Ed Sheeran. There's not really a media opportunity to run run advertising because it's

not broadcast. So they get less involved in those types of instances. But the Rose Bowls of the world, Devils for example, there could be media opportunities with games that are happening with the New Jersey Devils where the media team gets involved. And we figure out what makes the most sense for us to do based on what we're, because obviously there's a base level of what we're already running. So does it make sense for us to plus up in certain areas if the opportunity, you know, presents itself? So that's.

Steve Feuerstein (31:49.279)
And metrics, do you sit down after a season or throughout the season with your colleagues? How do you, if you could give us kind of a behind the scenes of what it's like to be in your shoes with these responsibilities, having a team that reports to you, how often do you do metrics reviews and trying to say, here are KPIs. And if you do, what are those KPIs? And then how do you actually assess those KPIs?

Dave Hamlett (32:19.116)
Yeah, we, yes, we do. We actually have an external agency that we work with who I'm not afraid to mention because they're wonderful. IEG is the name of the company from a sponsorship standpoint. So we bring them in on almost all the sponsorships that we do. Cause you know, we like to say we're not checking our own work. So we're actually having somebody help us as an expert in the area of sponsorship valuation. They come in and help us measure the results that we're seeing across most of our major sponsorships.

Steve Feuerstein (32:30.401)
Sure.

Dave Hamlett (32:45.944)
And then of course, when we do a larger scale sponsorship, the media team has their own measurements that they're looking at with the media portions of the Rose Bowl, for example. But when we're running anything tied to the Devils, New Jersey Devils, for example, and there's things happening inside the arena and whatnot, we bring in a property like our partners at IEG to help evaluate the effectiveness of what we're doing inside the arena. It also helps us figure out where our advertising placements lie and are they making sense? Are they effective? Do we need to tweak certain things?

At the end of the day, we're actually getting down to a value that showcases how much we're getting back from an ROI standpoint for each dollar that we're putting into the advertising, I'm sorry, into the sponsorship. So yes, I like to say that we have a pretty sophisticated way of measuring everything and we, yeah, that's what I'm talking to my C -suite about is the value that we're bringing back into the organization for each dollar we're spending.

Steve Feuerstein (33:40.759)
Under your tenure, has there been any property or any sponsorship you've had engaged that preceded you that you made the decision that you looked at and just said, you know what, it's just not working.

Dave Hamlett (33:51.874)
We've made the decision, we've evaluated many sponsorships and come close on a few of them, not getting into exact names or anything, but we've evaluated many sponsorships that we have said it's an attractive property, but it doesn't make sense for us.

Steve Feuerstein (34:05.579)
And what about ones that you've opted into and then said, it looked good at the time, but you know what? It just didn't have, it didn't hold weight. It didn't meet the objectives we have.

Dave Hamlett (34:18.796)
Yes, mean, I would say yes and no. There's ones that we've opted into that might not meet the objectives, but I also like to evaluate sponsorships on the value of the partners you're gonna be working with so that you can find, so that you know that if something is not quite working, you know that you can rely on those partners to tweak things, to try to bring it to as positive an outcome as possible. And we've been successful across the board in most of those areas. But yes, there's always gonna be things when you're evaluating them at the baseline, everything.

seems amazing at the forefront. And I think that there's value across everything that we've done, but there's always gonna be learnings along the way that you have to make tweaks and certain things are expected to go a certain way and it breaks another way. And you have to be willing to, that's the sweet thing that I love about sponsorships too, is you have be on your toes. You always have to be willing to pivot when you need to pivot to make things as, maximize the outcome is what I would say.

Steve Feuerstein (35:14.837)
You know, and I know that some of them may be out of date, but the cumulative number of sponsorships you have in the United States globally, what approximate number are we dealing?

Dave Hamlett (35:27.674)
I would say, so it's funny, I'll start here. When I first took over the sponsorship team, the primary property was the Prudential Center in New Jersey Devils. And it's grown since then. We actually had divested from some sponsorships back then, but today it's Prudential Center, the Devils, the Rose Bowl, Bobble Rock Music Festival. We also sponsor and activate the Rocket Mortgage Classic Golf Tournament in Detroit. We also do a major music festival in New Jersey called North to Shore, which is a three city in New Jersey music festival.

And then as you mentioned, Steve, globally, know, we also, and the Rose Bowl, of course, we've talked a lot about the Rose Bowl. Yeah, MLB, no, we haven't, we haven't, we haven't done anything in MLB during my tenure. And even before my time, we had done a little bit with, with soccer, but that's, that's not something, not to say, you know, what the future might hold, but that's just not something that we're active in right now. But the primary, but from a global standpoint, we also partner very closely with the folks at our affiliate brand, P -Gym.

Steve Feuerstein (36:03.337)
MLB I came across something that outdated I I showed

Dave Hamlett (36:27.444)
And we've helped them with sponsorships with, we did a tennis sponsorship last year with the number one player in the UK at the time, Cam Norrie. So that has gotten P -Gym a lot of, because their primary purview is overseas. So we're trying to find a way to get them. So that was a beautiful spot for them at Wimbledon. And we did some work with them on patching certain players at Wimbledon, not just Cam. And the wonderful thing that happened with P -Gym is we actually wound up patching the P -Gym logo on the woman who...

won Wimbledon last year. So I would say we've expanded the portfolio significantly. And even so coming out of the pandemic, yes, our name was on the Prudential Center and yes, we were a sponsor of the Devils, but we have really upped the level of how we are activating the sponsorships. Like there wasn't a whole lot happening because the pandemic had kind of suppressed everything. Coming out of that, it's been beautiful because the Devils have been wonderful partners and the team has started to perform well on the ice.

And so we've done more with the team. We've even, as far as we did a wonderful content series a year ago with Jack and Luke Hughes, our logos are on the helmets of the New Jersey Devils. So we were the first company to actually put a corporate logo on the helmet of an NHL team. And now you're seeing it all the time, which is wonderful.

Steve Feuerstein (37:43.105)
You know, I remember reading about it. I thought that was a very clever. I like that so much better than the patches on shirt. I just find it. There's something about that in hockey that I just think is so recognizable. It's so much more demonstrable. And you just because of the eye to eye contact with an athlete, you're already up in that kind of upper, you know, if the announcer is talking about, you know, look at Dave Hamlet, you know, the intensity, the focus, you're, I'm all eyes on you in that zone.

Dave Hamlett (37:49.688)
you

Dave Hamlett (37:56.291)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (38:12.683)
of kind of shoulder and above. And then of course, as they go in against the boards, you get a lot of good coverage there. It is very effective. It's interesting. Yesterday, just coincidentally, there happened to be an article about USC Trojans signed revolutionary partnership with CBD cannabis company. And when you look at that, the co -sponsor side, you've mentioned Jersey Mike's. The whole time that since you've mentioned that, I've been processing

Dave Hamlett (38:14.54)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (38:42.307)
I've been processing in my mind this, could there ever be a collaborative joint sponsor promo campaign between a Prudential and a Jersey Mike as an example? I see Prudential in a radically different environment in my zone of brand identity and the way I place you in the sphere of what does it evoke when I hear the name Prudential Financial versus what do I think of emotively?

when I hear the name Jersey Mike's. But as a co -sponsor or when you're getting involved in sponsorships, obviously today where the world of sponsorship is very different than it was five years ago with gaming companies, with alcoholic beverage companies, what we would have called non -family values brands, becoming almost normative in sponsorship today. Does the CBD factor

do anything to a sponsorship team? Does it do anything to evoke a team meeting concern or at this stage of the game with medical cannabis being so prevalent? Is it just a non -issue when we see an article like this and these types of messages where the journalist is trying to suggest there may be some concern?

Dave Hamlett (40:04.022)
Yeah, I would say, Steve, I'm not surprised when you see articles like that these days for a couple of reasons. In the crazy world of NIL and college sports, I think that folks are trying to find ways to generate revenue for the teams and the programs. So for USC, sure, maybe a cannabis program works for them. Yeah, I don't think a partnership like that would work with Prudential. No offense to anybody on that side of the industry, but...

But yeah, I mean, it really doesn't surprise me these days. think people are definitely looking for non -traditional ways to partner with organizations. And like you said, some of them are not the family values organizations that we've heard of in the past, but it's fine. mean, it's not surprising to me. Another example.

Steve Feuerstein (40:45.665)
Yeah, I mean, if they were at the Prudential Center, as an example, on the ice, in today's world, does it do anything to a team and sponsorship to suggest, is there anything that can somehow cause a concern in the confines of sponsorship decision makers as to who are the other sponsors along with us that are visibly being seen?

on the same TV screen and by the same live spectator.

Dave Hamlett (41:18.83)
interesting. I mean, I think there's a line that has to be drawn at some points. But it's interesting to see where that line moves to on a yearly basis. No, yeah, I hear you. mean, a couple years ago, it would have been unheard of to have gambling sites as prevalent as they are today. And you can't enter an arena today without seeing a gambling sports betting lounge or something like that.

Steve Feuerstein (41:28.565)
Now, I can't, to be frank with you, I can't think of it.

Steve Feuerstein (41:35.383)
100%.

Steve Feuerstein (41:45.857)
How about the Caesar's Superdome?

Dave Hamlett (41:48.43)
Exactly. Crypto companies obviously stepping in. is a form of finance, like it's, you know, at times it's an unstable form. Who knows what, you know, the cryptos are.

Steve Feuerstein (41:58.185)
You know, I like that, Dave. think that that I think you nailed it. I think that might be in today's universe outside of a personality that puts their name behind a bowl game. you're saying, wait a minute, I'm not touching that just because I don't want to be associated with that persona. However, I think you nailed it. I couldn't think of one. And I think that's about as close as we come to where people get a little bit of the willies behind the fact that maybe I really don't want that with all that's going on in the world of litigious activity.

Dave Hamlett (42:13.357)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (42:19.395)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (42:28.323)
and reputation and incarcerations, et cetera, et Good one. Thank you for thinking of one. I like that. know, joint promos, do you go into sponsorships and say, hey, look at this portfolio that we have, that we're joining this team of illustrious sponsors. We can get into their channels of distribution.

Dave Hamlett (42:33.368)
Absolutely. Of course.

Dave Hamlett (42:42.606)
Thank

Dave Hamlett (42:48.91)
So I would say we don't necessarily do it at the forefront outwardly facing from an advertising standpoint. However, one of the best parts about sponsorships in general is the partnerships that you can forge with the other sponsors that are working with properties. So I'll just tell you with the New Jersey Devils and the folks that are also co -sponsors of the team, we are pretty tight knit group, ourselves, Citizens Bank, RWJ Barnabas. So.

it's created a cool kind of like community where we talk about what's going on in the sponsorship space. I'd say there's definitely synergies to be had by building solid relationships with those other folks that are operating in the same space. And certainly there's always going to be the secret sauce that you keep to yourself, but there's the benefits without a doubt of forging partnerships. And again, it might not be outwardly facing. And I wouldn't even say that there wouldn't be an opportunity down the road if RWJ is doing something.

for the community and they want Prudential to jump on board and help out with it, there could be a possibility there or something like that, just as an example. But I think that the partnerships that are forged with the folks that are working with these properties have so much value under themselves. It's an underrated aspect, I think, of sponsorships.

Steve Feuerstein (44:02.897)
When you look at, we started off by talking about your reference to title sponsorship and Prudential Center is the consummate title sponsorship. Do you ever feel that your value generated when you're not a title sponsor becomes difficult at times to process and justify

Dave Hamlett (44:05.632)
Yeah

Steve Feuerstein (44:33.323)
versus what becomes so overtly value oriented because of just the earned media you're getting right from the get -go. Every single person who's ever going to do VIP corporate hospitality for any function at the Prudential Center is inviting their guests to the Prudential Center. So de facto, you're getting all the carry -on, this incremental value, this windfall.

Dave Hamlett (44:52.675)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (45:01.355)
from anyone and everyone who has a relationship in some commercial capacity. And then of course, with the fans who do have a commercial relationship because they're buying tickets to the event or the VIPs who are being gifted, but they're all going to the Prudential Center. The announcers are saying, welcome back to the Prudential Center here in Newark, New Jersey and the devils are on the ice in the third period. Every article, they're most of the time gonna have some reference to Prudential.

Dave Hamlett (45:21.814)
I... Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (45:31.147)
Does it get tempting to just go that route and attempt to be a title sponsor and forgo the other opportunities that come?

Dave Hamlett (45:38.316)
No, because I think, well it's funny, I think the Prudential Center is so important to us. It's an anchor institution in Newark. We've been on the building since the day the building opened essentially. And it's done great things for us. It definitely has. I do think that there's a lot of benefit for other companies, for example, to be active with teams and not necessarily be on the building. There's a lot of the value that we get, and we get major, major value at a major price tag, of course, to be on the building. But there is...

value to be had, significant value to be had, I think, by also partnering with a team in a building and not necessarily having your name on the building. So you could be in another market where you might be an official, whatever, let's not even say financial services category, an official category partner of another team in another market. I think the things that are so important, that still gives you the opportunity as a sponsor.

to take advantage of a lot that brings value back to the organization. So yes, the hospitality piece, the experiential activation that we talked about earlier. I mean, one of the most important things to me, and we activate it beautifully at the Prudential Center, but at all of the other, with all the other properties that we're involved in, is the value I can give back to my businesses by being able to say, I'm just gonna use my retirement strategies line of business as an example, hey guys, bring your annuities wholesalers out in some of their top clients.

to the Rose Bowl or bring it to this music festival. And the feedback we get from that is that that creates stickier clients. That brings prospects in the door. It's like, cause I talked about it earlier about endearing ourselves to folks in a way that they may not expect it from provincial. So folks that are existing clients may not expect to have been hosted at an amazing music festival in Napa Valley. So the example I'm giving there is I think that there's massive value to have your name on a building, but I also think when you play it correctly,

you can gain major value by just not being on the building as well in other markets. And it's it's figuring out what that mix is for you.

Steve Feuerstein (47:40.215)
And pound for pound, obviously, when you're not on that building. And the numbers you just referenced, you we had a really meaningful conversation with Doug Thornton over at ASM, who has about 130 venues under his purview, including the upcoming Caesar Superdome, formerly Mercedes Superdome, where he's gonna have their eighth Super Bowl being played in February.

Dave Hamlett (47:44.364)
Yeah.

you

Dave Hamlett (47:54.071)
yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (48:06.977)
When we talk about that, it's really interesting. He was talking about the number that Mercedes was putting in annually, and then the new number that Caesar's was putting in, and the amount of money activation represented in the overall spend. We have such mixed numbers in the marketplace of percentages. When you approach as a strategist sponsorship, Dave, how do you look at

I'm going to spend a dollar on the title rights fee that I'm paying out of pocket to get the IP rights from the owners of the Prudential Center, which I believe is it Harris Blitzer? that the? Yeah, yeah. So when you look at that, you're paying a rights fee to them annually to get the benefit of being able to call yourselves the Prudential Center, but to let the world know about it, to engage it, to activate, to have that experiential, to do all the VIP corporate hospitality.

Dave Hamlett (48:47.446)
That's how it's supposed to be.

Steve Feuerstein (49:04.791)
IEG 30 years ago was probably the leader in sports intelligence, had a metric at the time back in about 1995, 2000, where at that time their suggestion was a three to one spend, activation to rights fee. Now again, you and I both know, well, how much am I spending on rights fee? And if I'm sponsoring LeBron or I'm sponsoring an athlete who's an NIL athlete, well, my ratios are gonna be very, very different, right? My cost of entry,

Dave Hamlett (49:10.733)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (49:34.647)
is gonna prohibit me from having that three to one ratio per se, depending on what I'm spending. He suggested it was a seven to 10 that Caesar's was spending on activation compared to their rights fee, which again, he didn't do the deal and he's very knowledgeable. He's an extraordinary expert in his field. I would suggest that it was not a seven to 10 to one ratio. Could you give us what you think is a best practice spend? Let's just take it.

at a mid -level sponsorship. You paid X dollars for a sponsorship. Can you give us a range of what you think the activation spend should be above and beyond what we'll call as a mid -level sponsorship in professional sports?

Dave Hamlett (50:22.798)
Yeah, yeah. I would say to me, at a minimum, you're usually 75 cents to a dollar per dollar spent. But the caveat there too, Steve, is also how are you going about the activation? Are you leveraging an external agency to handle all of your activations and plan it all, for example? Because there's agency fees that get involved in that. That brings the price up. For me, I like to say, I'll go back to the fact that I think I have an amazing activation team internally.

that yes, we do partner with agencies, but we also have the ability in -house to do a lot of planning and creative that I don't always have to pay externally for. that, you you obviously have FTE dollars and cents you have to pay for, but that might bring my costs down a little bit. But I would say, and a lot of it depends too on the property you're talking about. Like a Rose Bowl is gonna be different than a local music festival in New Jersey, for example.

But I would say at a minimum to me, it's usually in the neighborhood of roughly a dollar, maybe a little bit less, a little bit more. But I also like to think of it in terms of some of the deals we do are multi -year deals. So if I build something for a property in year one, I want to be able to use that in year two and year three as well, with tweaks, of course. So the idea is like your operating costs for that sponsorship from an activation standpoint might be more in year one, and you can achieve efficiencies in year two and year three, while still

improving upon previous years. But I would say, yeah, I wish I could go seven to 10 times higher than that. I was climbing up for that. But yeah, I think we do a very effective job, not at that level. But you do need to be able to say, you never can look at a sponsorship and just figure what the rights fees are going to be. Because if you're not activating it appropriately, you're missing the boat entirely.

Steve Feuerstein (52:11.553)
You know, you look, and again, as obviously the presenting sponsor of the, I think it's the 110th Rose Bowl and the playoffs being there this year, which is extraordinary for you, when you look at that activation, and again, I'm gonna go back just for a moment to the Prudential Center. And because you have, I think it's one of the five most active in the form of revenues, it's some aspect of metric. Prudential Center is just unbelievable in its...

in the amount of activity, amount of events or stage at the Prudential Center. It's one of the top five in the world from my research. Does it ever, and I'm never here to put you in a tough spot of a question ever. To me, it's a user -friendly question because I lived it for my entire career and I saw it with hundreds of brands. VIP corporate hospitality, when you have so many events, can be a burden.

Dave Hamlett (52:45.506)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (52:53.389)
No, I'm good.

Steve Feuerstein (53:10.313)
It can be a real, I mean, it's a full -time occupation. So with the Prudential Center, concerts, all those events and sports, you have rights to every one of them as a title, is that correct? Most of them. Right, there may be a special concert coming in that, right.

Dave Hamlett (53:13.722)
yeah.

Dave Hamlett (53:22.732)
Most of them. mean, there's a couple events a year that... But yeah, most of them. Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (53:31.069)
Are you really getting value above and beyond earned media? Are you taking advantage of every single one of those for your clients and your shareholders? Where VIP corporate hospitality, those seats are getting filled with the tickets you have?

Dave Hamlett (53:43.97)
Yeah, that's a great question. I'll be honest, we are dark for a few Disney on Ice shows, but yeah, to be honest with you.

Steve Feuerstein (53:51.223)
I think I can peddle those for you, by the way. I think we can get them over to the Rutgers basketball teams.

Dave Hamlett (53:59.298)
You probably should, you probably should. But I'll be honest.

Yes, there's just a lot of them. There's just a lot of them. But I will say this actually, your timing on that question is great because we actually just instituted a brand new procedure across the business for how we use our hospitality assets for the Prudential Center, for Jersey Mike's Arena, as well as MetLife Stadium, because we have a suite at MetLife Stadium for all the events there as well. And yeah, I always say this, I think it's industry best practice as well, is like these are prime assets to generate business.

So we like to make sure that when our folks are using these, that they're bringing out the right people, that they're benefiting the business at the end of the day, that there's new business being created, there's business being held onto and so on and so forth, and not just folks being brought out on a consistent basis for employee appreciation, for example, which is important, don't get me wrong. But yeah, I would say we actually have instituted a wonderful process inside of Prudential within the last few months where

Steve Feuerstein (54:50.14)
Yep, yep.

Dave Hamlett (55:00.714)
All of my businesses have access and we almost do, believe it or not, we almost do a fantasy sports style draft where we list out the events and I've introduced a lot of people to the concept of a snake draft. So we list out the events and we have a great time with it. We have a person appointed from each of the businesses to take part in pulling the events through the businesses. They understand the ground rules that if you're picking an event, it is to be used for business generating purposes.

Steve Feuerstein (55:07.468)
love it.

Dave Hamlett (55:27.04)
and they'll go in. want the Devils game on this day. I want this concert at MetLife Stadium. And at the end of the day, like we, it's on the businesses to pay for their food and drink and all that stuff when they take advantage of these. But that has allowed us to make sure that these assets are being used and they're being used for the right reasons. And we even empower the businesses and tell them, we want them to come back to us. Tell us the stories about the benefits you're seeing, because it allows us to do more. So.

Steve Feuerstein (55:51.543)
I think what you just said is so refreshing to hear. I always have said throughout my experience in the business of sport, one of the most underutilized aspects of the benefits of sports sponsorship is internal rewards for employees who got you there. And we were always so focused, the brands, the sponsors were almost unilaterally focused on the client, but not recognizing who brought the client. And to hear that you instituted almost a...

Dave Hamlett (56:06.69)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (56:18.541)
Right.

Steve Feuerstein (56:21.515)
you know, a unique draft for tickets and utilizing it for business and getting people to feel rewarded for it and taking advantage of that. I really think that goes a far way for just employee morale when you're, when it's building a culture that the corporate culture is a place I wanna work. And for one person who, by the way, happened to just love Disney on ice, and maybe they really, and their kids did, and they got a,

A great photo autograph by Mickey Mouse with his blades. You know, it goes a long way and very refreshing, Dave. Please.

Dave Hamlett (56:56.728)
that actually quickly actually that's that's a really good good point there because what happens is when my businesses are done selecting whatever's left we make it available to the employees so that to that point but the other thing that's really important is when we do large -scale I call them tier one sponsorships the Rose Bowl bottle rock music festival in Napa Valley we want to make sure the employees feel included in that so every one of those we do we run an internal employee sweepstakes to say we're gonna reward tooth

two sets or four sets of folks and we're going to bring you with us. You're going to go to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. You're going to go to the music festival in Napa Valley. And the reaction you get from employees when they win these sweepstakes, we did one for the Bottle Rock. I think we had 2000 employees enter. It was unbelievable. And just the reaction the employees come back with, it's just so refreshing from our side to see that they feel included. And we want to, yeah, so that's, it's so important to us. It's actually instituted as a part of our strategy.

Steve Feuerstein (57:52.791)
I'd be remiss if I didn't just get one final query your way, because I am so in the box. Even though I say I'm not in the box, I'm a geometric figure, I'm some rhombus. I see it from a sports centric lens. Help me understand, you look at sports as a sponsorship vehicle, and you look at, let's just say music as a sponsorship vehicle. For my entire 35 years.

I'll be very frank, I always diminished the value of the music compared to sport. Is that an unfair, unfair sponsorship view? Should I see them as equivalents?

Dave Hamlett (58:32.034)
Yes, it's unfair and I will tell you why. We have come such a long way engaging the value of the folks that are attending, for example, music festivals. Our partner with Bottle Rock is Live Nation. And as you know, Steve Live Nation owns Ticketmaster. They have access to so much data about the people that are coming to these events. And we also get access to their network of folks that they're touching.

Steve Feuerstein (58:35.681)
Please.

Dave Hamlett (59:00.366)
across the Ticketmaster universe, for example. So we never would go into a music sponsorship just to say, sounds cool. Like we have done so much research in partnership with Live Nation to be very prescriptive about where we're inserting ourselves. So Bottle Rock and Napa, that is an absolute beautiful sweet spot for where our target audience is. And to me,

the folks that are seeing us there, not just from a hospitality standpoint, but also from walking around the festival and seeing Prudential as the title sponsor of the third stage, for example, it's very, very, very effective. So I would say sports rules, trust me, I get it, sports rules everything, but like music's right there. It's right there. Music and live events in general, it's right there.

Steve Feuerstein (59:49.153)
So I have one obligatory remark for all those very, very skewed folk like myself, the viewers here who have a preferential view of sports sponsorship. Dave, while highly refreshing, the only thing I don't see behind you is any memorabilia for music.

Dave Hamlett (01:00:07.006)
I'll let you.

Steve Feuerstein (01:00:14.679)
Only because you made such a darn good point. had just I couldn't resist even though we're zoomed in on you I couldn't resist just pointing out that it is interesting because I said you made such an outstanding point and when you started to talk about the data access To me, it just made total sense And then the only thing I just could retreat to was just looking at your background and reminding myself

Dave Hamlett (01:00:23.18)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (01:00:30.701)
Yeah.

Dave Hamlett (01:00:35.853)
Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (01:00:41.387)
that there is something so gorgeous about memorabilia in sport that Rutgers Dave speaks volumes to what I'll add in another conversation with you, because I really want to learn from you as I did today in many areas. I do want to learn from you as an expert in social media and sports, and we'll do it another time. Dave, really, Dave Hamlet, at the end of the day, one of the leaders, obviously the leader of sports sponsorship at Prudential.

Dave Hamlett (01:00:48.451)
Mary.

Dave Hamlett (01:00:59.042)
Love to. Yeah. Yeah.

Steve Feuerstein (01:01:09.632)
It was a pure pleasure to have you on the transaction report today.

Dave Hamlett (01:01:13.304)
Thank you for having me. Let's do it again. This was great. Thank you, Steve. Appreciate it.

Steve Feuerstein (01:01:15.809)
We will good Ryan's gonna come on for one quick sec. Thank you