By Sarah Kliff
Start with the St. Louis Steamers, add two new owners, subtract the uniforms and what do you get? An equally innovative and shocking advertising campaign that is working to resurrect indoor soccer within the city. Advertisements featuring five Steamers players clad only in soccer balls and accompanied by the message “Uniforms coming … ” have slowed traffic and proved the team’s “steaminess” has nothing to do with riverboats.
“Our challenge in buying the Steamers was to establish a brand that had been around 25 years and fallen off everyone’s radar,” says Wally Smerconish, one of the new co-owners of the Steamers. “The purpose of advertising is to create fan awareness. We’re selling a product, and you’ve got to admit that those guys on the poster are a great product.”
The Steamers were close to folding last year before Smerconish and Mike Hetelson purchased the team in September. Although neither is a St. Louis native, both are sports fans with an interest in taking on a challenge. The area was going to lose professional soccer altogether, says Hetelson. It seemed like an opportunity to do something good for St. Louis. There was also the challenge of turning around a struggling and failing business.
To help turn the team around, Smerconish and Hetelson focused on creating an ad campaign that would catch attention and draw a diverse fan base to games, which are now held at Savvis Center instead of at the Family Arena in St. Charles. The “Uniforms coming … ’’ ad, which has been featured in newspapers, on buses and in mall kiosks, came about largely through coincidence.
“We actually didn’t even get our uniforms until the night before the first game,” says Hetelson. “We were trying to turn things that were negative into positives and have a little bit of fun with it.”
While the owners had figured out how to create an eye-catching advertisement, they still faced another looming question: How do you get an entire soccer team to pose naked? “They were very skeptical and reluctant to do it,” Hetelson says. “The players weren’t just skeptical because of what we were asking them to do, but because they had been through a lot of owners.”
While some of the older and married players preferred not to be included in the advertisement, forward Aaron Susi has found it a fun experience. “I’m always up for something new,” says Susi. He says indoor soccer’s declining popularity needed something fresh to promote it.
While the Steamers’ signs are drawing attention, so is their play. In the first half of the season, they were shining—going from worst to first in their league and attracting crowds of more than 5,000. The team’s regular season continues through April. Check out www.steamerstv.com for more on the ads, or visit www.stlsteamers.com for more on the team.
