Don’t tell Christine Blake her credit union is too small to play in the big leagues. She’s CEO of $350 million Cardinal Credit Union headquartered in Mentor, Ohio and Blake is acutely aware that her institution is not one of the big players in financial services.
You might think NFL sponsorship is the exclusive domain of credit union behemoths such as $10 billion ENT, which is the official banking partner of the Denver Broncos, or $4 billion Northwest Federal Credit Union which has a stadium naming rights deal with the Washington Commanders, or $1.6 billion Community Financial Credit Union which has a deal with the Detroit Lions.
But that’s wrong. NFL relations are not only for the biggest credit unions and Cardinal is proof.
A few years ago, Cardinal inked a deal with the Cleveland Browns to be its official credit union and, yes, that’s the Cleveland Browns in the NFL.
Sure, the Browns have had a tough few recent years but a pro football team named the Browns in Cleveland goes back to the very beginning of professional football. In the Cleveland metro area, too, there remain hundreds of thousands of passionate Browns fans.
In the process Cardinal has run a promotion that featured Nick Chubb, a genuine Brown’s star, and it’s also launched a Lil Brownies savings card that has proven very popular among kids and their parents.
How did Blake ink this deal in the first place? In a conversation with me she said Cardinal had bought TV commercials during Browns games and team leadership consequently well knew the credit union and, then, “I had the opportunity to meet some leadership of the Browns at an event and we had a great conversation. We followed up with a few lunches and they proposed to me that they were looking for a partner in our space and they wanted to focus on the youth market.
“We thought this was a great idea. We were just getting ready to launch a debit card for kids. And to be able to have a card branded with the Browns just seemed like a perfect fit.”
Thus was born the Lil Brownies card.
Along the way, in cooperation with Visa, Cardinal Credit Union participated in a game of Financial Football in the Browns’ stadium. This pits teams of high schoolers against each other as they confront questions that arise in financial planning. So Blake saw Cardinal’s participation as good for the community and its teenagers and also good for Cardinal because of elevated brand awareness.
Blake admits there’s a drawback to the credit union’s participation with the Browns and that’s that she now gets to see fewer games in person. That’s because Cardinal buys a block of seats for every home game and there are drawings for tickets among Cardinal members—Lil Brownie cardholders for instance—and a result is the Cardinal Credit Union seating block is in high demand.
“I’m going to maybe one game a season now. But we get wonderful feedback from members who get the seats in our block,” said Blake.
In the process Blake has become something of a pro sports evangelist in the credit union universe. She has recently joined with ENT and Northwest Federal to put on a multi-day workshop for credit unions on how to work with pro teams and why a credit union should get involved.
And she admits she is looking beyond NFL football for possible ways for Cardinal to get involved in other pro sports.
Many other credit unions are involved in other pro sports.
In that regard, Vystar Credit Union is the official credit union of the Orlando Magic in the NBA.
At least three credit unions have relationships with Major League Baseball teams: CommunityAmerica with the Kansas City Royals, UW Credit Union with the Milwaukee Brewers, and PenFed with the Washington Nationals.
And Navy Federal as a relationship with the National Hockey League where Navy is the NHL’s military appreciation partner.
Understand, too, these relationships take many different forms. Some are “official financial institution” deals, others are stadium naming rights, and still others cover different ground. The point is: there are many ways to get involved with a professional sports team. And Cardinal Credit Union in Ohio vividly proves that even little credit unions can play in this game.
