October 2008

Extra

Distributor Navigates Democratic Convention Deal

What’s it like to be the promotional products provider for this year’s Democratic National Convention? Bob DeMasse has a hearty laugh at that one. “Sorry, I have to start with a laugh, because it’s a little difficult to try and put that into words,” offers the partner of Altitude Profit Consulting (asi/101511), by way of explanation.

Leave the words to the thousands of pundits putting this historic presidential race into context. DeMasse and his company were charged with a more unforgiving task: memorializing the monumental late-August convention in mementos and apparel. As DeMasse points out, it’s more than just slapping a logo on a T-shirt (they recruited noted urban designer Chris Christmas to do some of that). The experience has been, in a word, “eye-opening” from the start, though DeMasse’s good-natured attitude casts it in the most positive of lights.

Based in Denver, site of this year’s convention, APC has made a name for itself as a big-time sports apparel provider, partnering with Kroenke Sports Enterprises (owner of several Denver sports teams) and working with a variety of sports leagues through its singular Private Label program. Branching out, though, hasn’t been easy. APC initially sought both the national as well as the host committee license, but fortuitously missed the first and secured the second in early spring, the latter relying almost exclusively on wholesale with limited retail obligations.

APC then sought to distribute the merchandise nationally, but so far has failed to find the right sales network. “We’ve met with some surprising reluctance to participate with some of the chains,” states a mystified DeMasse, who can only hazard a guess at partisan interests being the source of such indifference. Other stores said they were waiting until just a couple of weeks before the convention to stock their shelves.

And there’s this famous stipulation, the first words on the Denver Host Committee’s Web site: “Our goal is to make this the greenest convention in history.” As a June article in the Wall Street Journal noted, easier said than done. The challenges are no different for DeMasse. Constraints included finding products that were environmentally friendly, USA-made and union-made, with special emphasis on minority-owned, woman-owned, veteran-owned and locally owned businesses. The resource pool was limited, to put it mildly. And all the hoops DeMasse has been forced to jump through? “It wasn’t exactly spelled out,” he says. He soon realized that decrees handed down from the national committee don’t always match the budget capabilities of the local host group. In short, says DeMasse, “It’s a bit more challenging than it was presented.”

But don’t think he regrets this opportunity for a second. “It certainly is not a negative in any sense. It can only be a positive,” he says about the experience. DeMasse admits that, if successful, he and APC partner Greg Bennett will consider pursuing similar events in other cities in the future. It’s given them increased access to corporate sponsors, strengthened their relationship with the city of Denver, and given a healthy dose of exposure to a company that is internally regarded as “the behind-the-scenes player, period.”