It’s no secret that Northeast Wisconsin’s iconic seasonal sports and special events such as the Packers, Timber Rattlers, EAA AirVenture and Road America races draw thousands of people each year.
And many of those fans walk away with a commemorative T‑shirt, mug, jersey, hat or other favorite souvenir that shows of team pride or says, “I was there.”
Each organization has a diligent behind‑the‑scenes team keeping its extensive retail presence up and running smoothly both in‑store and online, ensuring thousands of fans find just the right gear — any time of year.
Full throttle, year‑round
Road America in Plymouth has a strong season of racing May through October, but its Paddock Shop is open year‑round, says Julie Sebranek, director of retail and creative strategy.
“We have a 5,000‑square‑foot store, and much like the Packers and the EAA, we have traffic all the time,” she says. “So you have to really flex around big events, and people who drop in daily. Managing that amount of volume is challenging.”
Sebranek will take several buying trips each year to souvenir shows looking for items that will appeal to Road America fans, including novelty and non‑branded items with black‑and‑white checker accents, color schemes that align with motorsports teams and other special gifts. “I look for things that make people laugh or surprise them, and it’s such a joy to hear that happen in the store — when you hear your customers laughing or talking about something they love or like or find funny,” Sebranek says.
Traveling race fans also like to purchase items for their grandchildren, so there are plenty of children’s books and other items in the Road America shop. Sebranek says the retail side enhances the fan experience. “It’s a strong segment of the business, and … we curate everything that we buy, which really limits our risk,” she says.
About two‑thirds of Road America merchandise is apparel, much of it designed by Sebranek herself, who trained herself in graphic design. Some of the organization’s most popular apparel items feature an outline of Road America’s 14‑turn track. Fans often extend the organization’s brand impression by wearing those items to other tracks, Sebranek says.
Road America’s retail staff includes a team of three full‑time people and another 15 part‑time staffers during peak season. The online side is about 20% of sales. “We grow e‑commerce every year, but we understand the power of the onsite experience,” Sebranek says.
Road America and EAA in particular also consider guests from far away who haven’t anticipated the bite of Wisconsin weather or how hot it can get in the summer. Both organizations carry items that visitors might not think to bring or forget — jackets, sun hats and sunglasses.
‘It smells like the airshow’
Each year EAA sources about 2,500 different items, with more event merchandise added for AirVenture. The retail staff puts its AirVenture designs online starting in April, which allows them to see what’s going to be popular, says Scott Powers, director of retail operations for EAA. EAA has about 300,000 members “and to all of us, it is a passion 12 months a year, not just the one week at the end of July,” Powers says.
EAA works with dozens of vendors each year, including a Green Bay‑based illustrator who creates a “rip through” design, making it appear that the aircraft is ripping through the T‑shirt. “It takes a special Illustrator to be able to do that,” Powers says. “And then we’ve got others that are just really good at scenery. We know which vendors are best suited to what we’re trying to accomplish.”
When the organization has a design concept, the illustrations go through a stringent evaluation, Powers says.
“We’ll have people say, ‘That’s not a P51 F model; that’s an H model,’ because the tail moved three inches during those years,’’ says Dick Knapinski, EAA’s director of communications. EAA understands that customers are experts, and it’s part of the organization’s commitment to its members “that when you buy something that we are offering, we’ve scrubbed it,” Powers says. “We put in all the legwork to make sure that this is as accurate as possible.”
About 25,000 event T‑shirts are sold each year. Another big seller is the small handmade orange windsocks made by a local vendor, which people like to wear in their caps. “If we don’t have those in stock, there’s a riot,” Knapinski says.
EAA sees about 10% of its sales from e‑commerce each year, particularly in August when people buy what they forgot to pick up during AirVenture in July, Powers says. “When we send merchandise out for e‑commerce orders, we will actually put on there, ‘This was picked from the grounds during AirVenture’… if you grab that shirt and just smell it, it smells like the air show — you can smell that exhaust.”
EAA’s retail division has a team of about 16 full‑ and part‑time staff. EAA also brings in about two dozen summer staff, and during AirVenture, when EAA expands from its boutique to 17 more store locations on its grounds, the staff goes up to about 160 one‑week retail staff members. There’s no problem finding the help — it’s mostly 14‑year‑old workers.
“They come in, they’re in their suits, they’ve got a resume, and their resume is what you would expect,” Powers says. “‘You have any work experience?’ ‘I do. I babysit for the neighbor. I have a dog…’ They are dead serious.”
With the AirVenture show, EAA’s retail side is a seven‑figure operation, Knapinski says. “But much like the Packer Pro Shop, and much like the Snake Pit from the Timber Rattlers, there’s a year‑round draw, too.”
Swinging merch sales
The Timber Rattlers team store starts planning months ahead of time, with 80% of ordering completed by end of January to arrive in March, with the remainder ordered throughout the season, says Ryan Moede, vice president of business operations.
Popular items include novelties, T‑shirts, sweatshirts and blankets for those early‑April openers. Of course, the No. 1 item is hats, particularly the New Era 59FIFTY flat brim. “Everyone wants to match what those guys have … our guys wear 15 different hats with all the different theme nights.”
The Rattlers’ retail team consists of Moede and retail manager Zach Schneider, as well as a team of about 15 game day staffers. The Timber Rattlers have cracked Minor League Baseball’s top 25 in merchandise sales 18 times since 1995, Moede says.
About 80% of sales are in‑store, but the online store does well, particularly because collectors from around the country are seeking shirts and ball caps for the Timber Rattlers and their rebranded alternate identities. Recent rebrand iterations include the Udder Tuggers, Frozen Pizzas, the Shanty Men and the Brats.
That alternate‑identity rebranding across minor league baseball is huge. The Timber Rattlers have seen more than a 150% increase in merchandise sales since the introduction of alternate identity brands, Moede says. The team sold about $1 million in Udder Tuggers merchandise alone in its first year (2019), and sales are still on par with Timber Rattlers merchandise itself, “which is kind of crazy when we only play as the Udder Tuggers for four games every summer,” Moede says.
The Rattlers come up with rebrand ideas internally and work with San Diego‑based logo designer Brandiose. The Timber Rattlers are required to use vendors licensed by Major League Baseball, though the team has its own graphics department that creates its artwork, which can be printed locally. “It still has to go through the entire MLB licensing process,” Moede says.
Being a part of Major League Baseball has its benefits, too, as it has partnerships that allow the Rattlers to develop co‑branded merch with Star Wars or Harry Potter for those theme nights.
Retail goes long
Like the Timber Rattlers, planning starts well ahead of time for the Packers Pro Shop, about nine to 12 months ahead from when fans see products on the sales floor, says Chrysta Jorgensen, director of retail operations for the Green Bay Packers. “If you’re thinking Nike Sideline, that product is bought in October of the year prior to when we’ll wear it, and so the design work on that starts years before it ever sees the sales floor,” she says.
January through April, retail staff are buying hard goods like coozies and bobbleheads. “Sometimes you see a bobblehead and their hair is not the same as what they’re currently wearing, just because that bobblehead may have gone into design and production anywhere from six to 12 months earlier,” Jorgensen says.
Pro Shop merch comes from a variety of designers, and similarly to MLB, anything with the NFL brand must be approved and produced with an NFL licensee, Jorgensen says. “That does limit us on what we can bring in,” she says. “We have a lot of local companies or fans who have great ideas, but unfortunately, we’re not always able to capitalize on those because of the rules that we abide by with the NFL.”
The Packers retail team includes 28 full‑time staff in five divisions: distribution, e‑commerce, stadium operations, customer operations/staffing and buying. It takes a lot of products to fill up the 21,000 square feet of the Pro Shop, and favorites are caps, jerseys and knit hats. “We sell an unbelievable amount of winter knit hats,” Jorgensen says. Jerseys are also a big seller, either pre‑made or custom.
E‑commerce is a growing space for the Packers Pro Shop website, which is run in‑house. “You don’t find that very often in NFL,” Jorgensen says. “We’re one of three teams that operates our own website,” she adds, along with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Las Vegas Raiders. “That gives us a lot of opportunities on the marketing aspect.”
While Packers merch is available in many retail locations, buying from the Packers Pro Shop sends revenue back into the fan experience, Jorgensen says. “We love that we are owned by our fans, and it makes it a special place to come and visit. And making a purchase at the store or even online is part of that experience.”
