The Chicago Cubs and Sloan Valve Company announced a partnership that makes the Franklin, Ill.-based maker of water-efficient sustainability products the new naming rights holder for the baseball team’s spring training facility in Mesa, Ariz., that is now known as Sloan Park.
“This is a perfect partnership with a Chicago-area company with a history just as rich as Wrigley Field and the Chicago Cubs,” said Julian Green, vice president of communications and community affairs with the Cubs. “We are happy that Sloan will have a very visible presence in Mesa in the second year of the team’s spring training ballpark.”
Green is not exaggerating about the visible presence. He noted that fans flying to Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport are on a flight pattern that takes them directly over the stadium where the Sloan Park logo is present on top of the roof of the grandstand.
Green would say only that the agreement is a “multiyear deal and a seven-figure deal” and was negotiated in-house. Sloan Park seats 15,000 and is the largest by capacity spring training stadium in Major League Baseball.
Sloan will have additional signage on the home plate and first base gates as well as throughout the ballpark. All signage changeover will be completed in time for the team’s first game on March 5, Green said. The company will have brand presence to include designated areas to showcase Sloan products and state-of-the-art water-saving technologies.
Green said that Sloan’s deal includes other perks, namely hospitality, that gives Sloan the privilege of using suites for their own employees or to designate for clients.
“Obviously with any partnership there are some hospitality elements like suites and things of that nature,” he said. “I can’t go into specific terms, but we will make sure that their brand is properly represented and has a premium exposure.”
“What we endeavor to do in Mesa is promote our water efficiency message,” said Jim Allen, president and CEO of Sloan and whose great-grandfather, William Elvis Sloan, founded the company in 1906. “We and the Cubs share a water efficiency vision of sustainability and we look forward to being responsible members of the community and in venues throughout the country wherever our products are found.
“As far as the partnership, the Cubs, like us, are long-term Chicago residents and a family-owned business as well. We saw the synergies as being obvious and beneficial to both parties.”
Indeed, while the naming rights deal in Mesa is new, the company’s relationship in Chicago with the Cubs and Wrigley Field goes back to when the stadium was constructed in 1914. Sloan has operated with its flush valves and sink systems continuously and will continue to have a presence at Wrigley after the four-year ballpark expansion and restoration known as The 1060 Project is completed, including signage in the visiting team’s bullpen and two additional restrooms to showcase the company’s latest technology.
“This is an organization that has prided itself on helping the environment through water conservation,” Green said. “As we move forward with this unique and unprecedented construction project to expand and enhance Wrigley Field, Sloan will be part of the project.”
Green said that Sloan’s commitment to a long-term, multiyear deal makes them the team’s sixth Legacy Partner, a designation that makes the company the team’s Official Water Efficiency Partner.
First and foremost for Allen is making sure that the company’s brand is elevated through presence in both Mesa and Chicago.
“Sloan is a brand that’s kind of unique in that everybody recognizes it sometimes the second time they hear it,” he said. “If you say you work for Sloan, people will kind of nod their head but you say commercial bathrooms or flush valves and they go, ‘Oh, yeah, I see you everywhere I go,’ no pun intended.”
Actually, Allen is quick to share a good pun or joke because, after all, he knows he is in a business where his company’s name is plastered on toilets at numerous public assembly venues.
“Men tend to know our brand far better than women,” he said. “Women have their back to us when they use our product.”
Interviewed for this article: Jim Allen, (847) 671-4300; Julian Green, (773) 404-2827