Lara Krug, Kansas City Chiefs Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer

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Rick talks with Lara Krug from Adobe Summit in Las Vegas.

Lara Krug was hired as Kansas City’s Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer on June 29, 2021 and begins her third season in the National Football League in 2023.

As the first CMO in franchise history, Krug oversees all club marketing functions, including brand marketing; community outreach; digital, social and website operations; influencer activation; event entertainment; content production and the Hunt Family Foundation.

Reporting directly to team President Mark Donovan, she strategically and proactively works across the organization to identify opportunities to help internal and external stakeholders achieve key growth objectives. Employing short- and long-term strategies, Krug and the marketing team are focused on brand extensions and loyalty with current and new fans; engaging with fans through original content across all the club’s social, digital and mobile channels; as well as creating once-in-a-lifetime experiences domestically and globally all in an effort to welcome all to Chiefs Kingdom.

In addition to managing all domestic marketing efforts for the team, Krug is leading the club’s international growth in both Germany and Mexico as part of the NFL’s IHMA (International Home Marketing Area) announcement in 2021. This league initiative grants clubs access to international territories for marketing, fan engagement and commercialization, enabling the Chiefs to build a more robust global brand while driving NFL fan growth internationally.

Prior to joining the Chiefs, Krug spent more than seven years in multiple marketing roles with Anheuser-Busch InBev, eventually taking over as Vice President of U.S. Marketing for Stella Artois (2018-21). Before leading the national marketing efforts for Stella Artois, she served as the Vice President of U.S. Marketing for Anheuser-Busch InBev’s Regional Brands, including Estrella Jalisco, Landshark, Presidenté, Beck’s and Kirin. Those roles saw her develop and lead experiential platforms and campaigns around Super Bowl LIV (2020) and the FIFA World Cup (2018). She also held positions as the Director of Global Experiential Marketing and Director of Global Digital and Media Operations at Anheuser-Busch InBev.

Before joining A-B InBev, she spent three years with L’Oréal USA, where she finished her time as Associate Vice President of Global Digital Marketing, overseeing the creation of digital and social content toolkits, CRM and data capture strategy. Prior to L’Oréal, Krug was the Manager of Online Marketing for Avon Inc. and Avon.com and was a Media Strategist for multiple national clients at PHD Media.

Robert W. Cohen, ‘The 50 Greatest Players in Braves History’

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The 50 Greatest Players in Braves History examines the careers of the 50 men who made the greatest impact on one of Major League Baseball’s oldest and most iconic franchises. Using as measuring sticks the degree to which they impacted the fortunes of the team, the extent to which they added to the Braves legacy—in Boston, Milwaukee, and Atlanta—and the levels of statistical compilation and overall dominance they attained while wearing a Braves uniform, The 50 Greatest Players in Braves History ranks, from 1 to 50, the top 50 players in team history.

Rick talks with the author, Robert Cohen about this great book.

Cohen was born in the Bronx, New York in 1956. He grew up just a few miles from Yankee Stadium, rooting for the Yankees and New York Football Giants. After spending many years working in a large corporate environment, he began writing professionally in 2004. His first published work, “A Team For The Ages: Baseball’s All-Time All-Star Team” clearly reflects his great love of the game of baseball, and also his vast knowledge of the sport.

Roger Duthie, BearFish Sports Apparel

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Great hats and more.

Rick is joined by Roger Duthie this week on ‘Tech of Sports.’

BearFish is a boutique Dubai brand and will appeal to a certain demographic who care about quality, comfort and fashion while playing their favorite sport. With its first line of caps, the brand aims to bring back color into outdoor sport. The founder Roger Duthie claims that the golf public has gotten dull with lack of color and designs and hopes his products will inspire people to wear brighter colors and according to him, put people in a better mood on the golf course! A real showcase to the world that incredible creativity can come from the UAE and BearFish.\

Courtney Jeffries, CEO of Virtual Tables

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Sports fan engagement.

Brainstorming dynamic and fresh approaches to fan engagement by combining traditional experiences with the digital era can be a challenge. Organizations in sports need to begin to understand the idea of extracting the lifetime value of the customer.

In professional sports 1% of all fans will go to a game live, but in today’s globalized digital world, why aren’t all sports organizations taking advantage of this connectedness?

Rick is joined by Courtney Jeffries, CEO of Virtual Tables. Virtual Tables is a startup that provides tools to organizations to help bridge the gap between themselves and their global audience.

Their flagship product is DigiSign, a 1:1 digital autograph platform product that allows sports fans to receive a personalized autograph and a meet and greet session with fans all over the world.

DigiSign has been used across 30+ countries with multiple sports organizations. Including the Formula 1 team, Williams Racing, The Connecticut Sun WNBA Team and the Athletes Unlimited sports league.

Courtney talks about:

The importance of platforms like DigiSign in the NIL era

Innovative fan engagement strategies for sports teams

Transforming traditional collectible experiences in the digital age

Eliminating the need for geographic limitations by taking advantage of global fan engagement tools

A great talk with Courtney.

John G. Louis, CEO of Acuforce International, Hall of Fame Sports Massage Therapist

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Talking to sports massage therapist, John G. Louis, this week.

He’s here to introduce his new product, the Hall of Fame™ self-massage tool. The patent-pending “self-manager” massage tool provides a focused and individualized pressure point that instantly delivers measurable results and benefits.

Here are some features that make the Hall of Fame™ self-massage tool distinctive:

Developed by a licensed Hall of Fame™ Sports Massage Therapist, John G. Louis, CEO of Acuforce International, Inc, a therapeutic product line, is a 42-year veteran Licensed Massage Therapist for major sports league players and Director of the Massage Therapy Center of Winnetka.

Endorsed by Frank Thomas:The patent-pending Hall of Fame™ Massage Toolis endorsed by Frank Thomas, the 2014 Major League Baseball Hall of Fame inductee.

Trigger-point therapy: The Hall of Fame™ massage tool is handy for self-massage allowing the user, both professional and consumer alike, to perform effective therapeutic techniques, such as trigger-point therapy & muscle release, for the back, neck, shoulder, hips, and more.

Stainless steel quality: Shape like a wide-angle cane, the rigid bar is the only self-massager made of high-quality stainless steel, not plastic. At the same time, the soft-coated plastisol metal treatment tip accurately replicates a therapist’s thumb.

A pioneer and leader in sports medicine and rehabilitation. John is an inventor of numerous product concepts, educator and therapist for some of the world’s best professional athletes. He was inducted into the Massage Therapy Hall of Fame in 2022.

John founded Massage Therapy Center of Winnetka in 1989. The clinic is rated the best on the North Shore of Chicago. Located on Green Bay Road in Winnetka, Illinois, the clinic employs 5 certified and licensed massage therapists. In 1999, John created Acuforce International, Inc. a company that markets his patented soft-tissue therapy tools. A division of that company called Chocolate Milk Productions produced “Infant Massage Lessons for Dads”. An instructional DVD that teaches fathers how to bond with their babies while helping the infants to sleep better and develop more rapidly. The program has won 2 video excellence awards, 2004 Aurora Gold Award and the 2005 Telly Award.

John just launched a product in 2020 called the Freebounder Fitness and Rehab Machine. The machine is patented and is easily the most comprehensive machine ever created for the product space.

Keith Marshall, co-CEO of The Players’ Lounge, Former UGA Football, Former NFL

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Rick is joined by Keith Marshall, former University of Georgia football player, former NFL player and now Co-CEO of The Players’ Lounge, a NIL-focused platform built to empower relationships between current and former college athletes.

Rick was able to attend a panel with Keith in Alpharetta, Ga. Talking about the current NIL landscape, how to best work with student-athletes and how to build a business in the collegiate space. Keith was joined by Matt Hibbs, CEO of Classic City Collective, Chris Smith, Student-Athlete at the University of Georgia, and panel moderator, Kim Hartsock, Office Managing Member of ACG.

Marshall talks candidly about NIL, what The Players’ Lounge is doing and the ever-evolving face of college athletics.

Have a listen.