England RL x Oxen - 5 year deal

[Tommygilf]

6 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I live in Edinburgh and I have never heard anybody denigrate RL about cheap branding. Only RL fans tbh. 

Is that because nobody watches the Scottish League team though?

[Dave T]

7 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Is that because nobody watches the Scottish League team though?

There are obviously a lot of people who have no awareness of RL, but I'm talking about the sports fans that I do know who are often International RU fans and when discussing international RL it's just never a thing that is discussed or made an issue of. 

I've watched a fair few internationals with people up here and it just doesn't get a mention. We look like a smart England International team and I don't think they give it much more thought than that. 

The most disparaging people about RL I have come across are on here. 

[Tommygilf]

1 minute ago, Dave T said:

There are obviously a lot of people who have no awareness of RL, but I'm talking about the sports fans that I do know who are often International RU fans and when discussing international RL it's just never a thing that is discussed or made an issue of. 

I've watched a fair few internationals with people up here and it just doesn't get a mention. We look like a smart England International team and I don't think they give it much more thought than that. 

The most disparaging people about RL I have come across are on here. 

Fair enough, that's not been my experience.

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

24 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I live in Edinburgh and I have never heard anybody denigrate RL about cheap branding. Only RL fans tbh. 

I think you are misunderstanding my arguments. I've never heard anybody denigrate RL about cheap branding either - it is their subconscious perceptions of RL that are caused in part by the lack of any strong brand identity (be it England RL, Super League or whatever).

Aldi/Lidl make their product packaging look near as dammit identical to the premium brands. They are communicating to consumers that Rola Cola is pretty similar to Coca Cola, but it's a bit cheaper and will save you some money in the long run.

Pepsi make their product packaging look completely different to Coca Cola. They are communicating to consumers that they are not Coca Cola. They are a completely different and alternative product.

My fear, borne out by my experience of living outside of the heartlands, is that many people subconsciously view RL as a Rola Cola version of RU. IMO, as a sport we need our branding to communicate that we are not RU - we are something different (and better).

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

The most disparaging people about RL I have come across are on here. 

Unfortunately that isn't my experience.

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

I think you are misunderstanding my arguments. I've never heard anybody denigrate RL about cheap branding either - it is their subconscious perceptions of RL that are caused in part by the lack of any strong brand identity (be it England RL, Super League or whatever).

Aldi/Lidl make their product packaging look near as dammit identical to the premium brands. They are communicating to consumers that Rola Cola is pretty similar to Coca Cola, but it's a bit cheaper and will save you some money in the long run.

Pepsi make their product packaging look completely different to Coca Cola. They are communicating to consumers that they are not Coca Cola. They are a completely different and alternative product.

My fear, borne out by my experience of living outside of the heartlands, is that many people subconsciously view RL as a Rola Cola version of RU. IMO, as a sport we need our branding to communicate that we are not RU - we are something different (and better).

We should maybe not be so insecure and make RU such a big part of our thinking just in case some people subconsciously think something that you have just come up with. 

We used a differentiator for years, and still do (the red Cross) and people moan about it. 

You have a preference and are trying to create a theory to support it. It's perfecy OK to believe that we should differentiate ourselves at every opportunity. But it's also perfectly OK to want the England team to look like and England sports team. 

The England RL brand has shown glimpses of how big it can be, incompetence around planning (and chasing an iconic brand ironically) has held it back. 

[Dave T]

6 minutes ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

Unfortunately that isn't my experience.

Haters are gonna hate. Move on they aren't our target audience. 

[Tommygilf]

1 minute ago, Dave T said:

We should maybe not be so insecure and make RU such a big part of our thinking just in case some people subconsciously think something that you have just come up with. 

We used a differentiator for years, and still do (the red Cross) and people moan about it. 

You have a preference and are trying to create a theory to support it. It's perfecy OK to believe that we should differentiate ourselves at every opportunity. But it's also perfectly OK to want the England team to look like and England sports team. 

The England RL brand has shown glimpses of how big it can be, incompetence around planning (and chasing an iconic brand ironically) has held it back. 

We can't not recognise that our image is going to be at least in some part affected by RU. We effectively share an intellectual  visual and naming IP. You can't just say its not worth bothering about and make it so. 

Indeed every international RL side I can think of, bar the all white England kits, the Scotland shirts and occasionally Fiji, uses a V and/or a colour switch to make itself as clearly RL and as clearly not the RU team as possible. If the sports leaders in the 30s and 50s had the vision to see that I don't see why its a major point of debate today frankly?

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

2 minutes ago, Dave T said:

We used a differentiator for years, and still do (the red Cross) and people moan about it. 

But I haven't moaned about it. I'm not a fan of it - it isn't my personal preference. But I can get on board with it if that's what they decide to stick with as a differentiator.

3 minutes ago, Dave T said:

You have a preference and are trying to create a theory to support it. It's perfecy OK to believe that we should differentiate ourselves at every opportunity. But it's also perfectly OK to want the England team to look like and England sports team. 

We could look like England cricket and play in blue. Or look like England hockey and netball and play in red. Or look like England football and play in white with navy blue shorts. At present we have chosen to look almost identical to the England team from a sport that also looks almost identical to the untrained eye.

7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

The England RL brand has shown glimpses of how big it can be, incompetence around planning (and chasing an iconic brand ironically) has held it back. 

Fair point.

7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Haters are gonna hate. Move on they aren't our target audience. 

The vast majority don't hate RL - they're just completely ignorant of what it is.

[Spidey]

42 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I live in Edinburgh and I have never heard anybody denigrate RL about cheap branding. Only RL fans tbh. 

That’s the point here. We’re our own worst enemies

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, Tommygilf said:

We can't not recognise that our image is going to be at least in some part affected by RU. We effectively share an intellectual  visual and naming IP. You can't just say its not worth bothering about and make it so. 

Indeed every international RL side I can think of, bar the all white England kits, the Scotland shirts and occasionally Fiji, uses a V and/or a colour switch to make itself as clearly RL and as clearly not the RU team as possible. If the sports leaders in the 30s and 50s had the vision to see that I don't see why its a major point of debate today frankly?

I can state its a non-issue and point to events like the World Cup in 2013 (and I think we will see some huge England games this year if allowed) as supporting evidence. 

I'm not seeing any evidence of how it is holding us back presented. 

[Tommygilf]

Just now, Dave T said:

I can state its a non-issue and point to events like the World Cup in 2013 (and I think we will see some huge England games this year if allowed) as supporting evidence. 

I'm not seeing any evidence of how it is holding us back presented. 

I think that is buying into something bigger then with trying to look like an England team rather than an England RL team so to speak. There's certainly merit in piggybacking off the back of the pre-existing stuff like "England", "Rugby", we even adopted "3 lions", but does come with a certain loss of self-identity.

If that is the strategy, lets go whole hog on that, but also accept that with any strategy there are downsides too.

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

10 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I can state its a non-issue and point to events like the World Cup in 2013 (and I think we will see some huge England games this year if allowed) as supporting evidence. 

What about the 2017 World Cup final? Did that permeate the national consciousness? Not in the Midlands unfortunately. Home world cups are always going to generate a higher level of interest. What else can we do in the intervening years to prevent England RL's profile dropping off the radar completely? Playing more games is the obvious one, but why stop there? Why not explore every possible opportunity to give us a distinct brand identity?

10 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I'm not seeing any evidence of how it is holding us back presented. 

As I've said, I don't have any evidence but have provided a theory borne out by my personal experience. Your personal experience is different, but equally you haven't provided any evidence either. Until some appropriate market research is conducted by the RFL then we're just guessing. 

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

What about the 2017 World Cup final? Did that permeate the national consciousness? Not in the Midlands unfortunately. Home world cups are always going to generate a higher level of interest. What else can we do in the intervening years to prevent England RL's profile dropping off the radar completely? Playing more games is the obvious one, but why stop there? Why not explore every possible opportunity to give us a distinct brand identity?

As I've said, I don't have any evidence but have provided a theory borne out by my personal experience. Your personal experience is different, but equally you haven't provided any evidence either. Until some appropriate market research is conducted by the RFL then we're just guessing. 

I'm afraid the burden of providing evidence that something is wrong has to be on the person making the claim. 

We do have evidence that this isn't an issue, we know that using the current branding we can deliver huge crowds, big TV figures, some national sponsors, national media coverage with the BBC and Sky and so on. Things were no better with kits with chevrons. 

England RL's challenges are far bigger than the kit, which is a pure preference until somebody provides evidence that kit design is problematic. 

Anyway, despite saying happy to disagree a few times I'm still here debating! All good stuff, enjoyed the discussion and respect yours (and @Tommygilf's view on it). 

Cheers. 

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

1 minute ago, Dave T said:

I'm afraid the burden of providing evidence that something is wrong has to be on the person making the claim. 

And yet you haven't provided any evidence that I'm wrong... 

3 minutes ago, Dave T said:

We do have evidence that this isn't an issue, we know that using the current branding we can deliver huge crowds, big TV figures, some national sponsors, national media coverage with the BBC and Sky and so on. Things were no better with kits with chevrons. 

Without having the stats available, my feeling (based on no evidence whatsoever!) is that the game's national profile has diminished over the last 20 years and continues to do so. It feels like RL is becoming less and less relevant to the wider public. Playing more internationals will be the most significant way to address this IMO. But I do think they need to explore every avenue to create a much stronger identity for RL and for the national team.

8 minutes ago, Dave T said:

England RL's challenges are far bigger than the kit

Agreed. The most significant gains will be made by England playing more regular games. But there are still the incremental improvements via the 1 percenters that I don't think we should ignore.

11 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Anyway, despite saying happy to disagree a few times I'm still here debating! All good stuff, enjoyed the discussion and respect yours (and @Tommygilf's view on it). 

Fear not - I can still throw my toys out of the pram and degenerate into playground insults!

Cheers 

[Tommygilf]

3 new "Retro Shirts" for the Rhinos from Oxen just released. On top of 4 shirts released for this season already, that said if these are longer term products then I suppose they had to come out sometime!

I'd hope these would be long term shelf fillers like the Score-Draw retro football shirts are. 

[Mr Plow]

45 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

3 new "Retro Shirts" for the Rhinos from Oxen just released. On top of 4 shirts released for this season already, that said if these are longer term products then I suppose they had to come out sometime!

I'd hope these would be long term shelf fillers like the Score-Draw retro football shirts are. 

Big market for classic shirts, Ellgren have been doing this as well. 
 

Oxen make some nice looking stuff it’s just the quality that’s a concern

[jacobus]

Some teasers about whats to come...

 

 

[RP London]

42 minutes ago, jacobus said:

Some teasers about whats to come...

 

 

looks ok, difficult to tell, maybe the inside of the hood of a hoody?

 

[EastLondonMike]

1 hour ago, RP London said:

looks ok, difficult to tell, maybe the inside of the hood of a hoody?

 

it is the inside of a hoody. Think it was mentioned on one of their insta posts. The more i see of the Oxen/England gear, albeit in small snippets, the more worried i get.

They posted a pic of Shaun Wane wearing a black jacket on insta recently. Which looked pretty bad. I fear they are going to get pretty badly beaten with the quality stick when they launch.

[Tommygilf]

2 hours ago, EastLondonMike said:

it is the inside of a hoody. Think it was mentioned on one of their insta posts. The more i see of the Oxen/England gear, albeit in small snippets, the more worried i get.

They posted a pic of Shaun Wane wearing a black jacket on insta recently. Which looked pretty bad. I fear they are going to get pretty badly beaten with the quality stick when they launch.

Tbh I think that and the stuff for the monster promo was a rushed stuff for the photo opp in fairness.

[Southerner]

 

[EastLondonMike]

4 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

Tbh I think that and the stuff for the monster promo was a rushed stuff for the photo opp in fairness.

There's no benefit in putting out poor product mate. Even for a photo op.

[Eddie]

There’s nothing wrong with the current England badge, in fact it’s distinctive and I like it, there’s no reason to change it again. 

[Whippet13]

12 hours ago, Southerner said:

 

Excellent sponsor / partner, well done to England RL for this one.