The uniqueness of sport: Testing against marketing's empirical laws

Bradley J. Baker, Heath McDonald and Daniel C. Funk

Sport Management Review, 2016, vol. 19, issue 4, 378-390

Abstract: •Application of marketing's empirical generalisations to sport consumption.•Empirical generalisations include double jeopardy and duplication of purchase laws.•Evidence of these laws holding in a spectator sport context was found.•Game attendance and team support were influenced by market share.•Best practice in other industries should be considered when managing sport consumers.Two key law-like patterns – the double jeopardy and duplication of purchase laws – have consistently been found to explain and predict consumer behavior across a wide range of industries. There has been speculation that these empirical generalisations may not hold in the case of professional team sport brands. The reasons given include the passionate loyalty of sport fans, the fact that two sport teams must be consumed at once in any contest, and the strong geographic dominance of sport brands. In this study, we examine the applicability of these two law-like generalisations to professional team sport. With a few caveats, these law-like patterns hold, suggesting that sport team brands operate in line with what is known about other consumer markets. Results suggest the unique aspects of the sport market do not meaningfully impact consumer behavior and therefore sport brands should be managed in fundamentally the same way as most consumer markets.

Date: 2016
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DOI: 10.1016/j.smr.2016.02.002

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