National Football League Properties
In 1979, he joined NFL Properties (NFLP), the marketing and merchandising arm of the National Football League, where he ascended to the position of President of NFL Properties in 1986. At NFLP, he helped transform licensed apparel from a small business selling novelty merchandise in specialty stores into everyday fashion transcending fan-wear, sold at major chain sporting goods and department stores. In addition to creating NFL ProLine authentic sideline gear and apparel made available to consumers to so that they could "Wear What the Pros Wear", Bello drove major sponsorships with Coke, Canon, Gatorade, Miller Brewing, GTE, Apple, Citibank, American Airlines and many consumer food products through a Sunday insert program called the "NFL Tailgate Party." He also played a major role in creating the NFL Experience, a fan festival that is now a fixture and fan favorite at Super Bowls. Also, Bello helped organize the American Bowl series of international pre-season games starting with the 1986 game between the Refrigerator Perry led Super Bowl Champion Chicago Bears and Dallas Cowboys played in front of 81,000 fans at London's Wembley Stadium. Bello's innovative approach to promoting and enhancing the NFL experience included bedecking pro golfer Payne Stewart in NFL Team colors as he played on the tour, sponsoring NASCAR racers, women's lines of NFL team clothing and made for TV events such as the Quarterback Challenge and The NFL's Fastest Man.
During Bello's tenure at NFLP, the business grew from $30 million in retail sales, sponsorships and publishing to $3 billion when he left in 1993. Bello is broadly credited with creating the model by which every major sports league now operates. He was ranked 46th on Sporting News’ list of Most Powerful People in Sports in 1992.
Bello left NFLP on Labor Day in 1993 amid controversy. He resigned as a result of losing a power struggle with then-NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue who was seeking to consolidate league operations under the commissioner's office.
Read more about this topic: John Bello
Famous quotes containing the words national, football, league and/or properties:
“...America has enjoyed the doubtful blessing of a single-track mind. We are able to accommodate, at a time, only one national hero; and we demand that that hero shall be uniform and invincible. As a literate people we are preoccupied, neither with the race nor the individual, but with the type. Yesterday, we romanticized the “tough guy;” today, we are romanticizing the underprivileged, tough or tender; tomorrow, we shall begin to romanticize the pure primitive.”
—Ellen Glasgow (1873–1945)
“... in the minds of search committees there is the lingering question: Can she manage the football coach?”
—Donna E. Shalala (b. 1941)
“He will deliver you from six troubles; in seven no harm shall touch you. In famine he will redeem you from death, and in war from the power of the sword. You shall be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, and shall not fear destruction when it comes. At destruction and famine you shall laugh, and shall not fear the wild animals of the earth. For you shall be in league with the stones of the field, and the wild animals shall be at peace with you.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Job 5:19-23.
“A drop of water has the properties of the sea, but cannot exhibit a storm. There is beauty of a concert, as well as of a flute; strength of a host, as well as of a hero.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)