Topic: Babar Azam joins Gray Nicolls (Read 10563 times)

brokenbat · « **Reply #45 on:** December 02, 2020, 09:31:31 PM »

Quote from: Jeff Navarro on December 02, 2020, 08:16:57 AM

Would Azam be considered cheap at $100,000 per year? Someone like de Villiers is getting $500,000 per annum from MRF despite rarely playing in recent years.

He�s a steal at that price (relative to what other pros get). Young, with plenty of years to go, and a top tier batsman in all three formats. Also helps that unlike a Graeme Smith, he�s a very watchable player (cover drive and back foot punch are already talked about)... so should be a great advertisement for whoever sponsors him.

Neon Cricket · « **Reply #46 on:** December 03, 2020, 07:43:04 AM »

Quote from: ScottParko on December 02, 2020, 07:43:11 PM

The delta? They�ve been �teasing� it for a long long time like. It went on sale today either way, only 20 I think.

Not sure I get these "20" limited edition bats, they did it with the NHS one too - 20 bats is absolute peanuts to someone like GN.

It almost begs the question why they bother as they'll barely be getting any revenue from it. I can almost guarantee the resource spent on designing/producing/marketing the products will outweigh any profit they see off them (by resource I'm talking the total combination of manpower as well as actual material costs).

The NHS one was a bit of a farce too - make a big song and dance about supporting the NHS/keyworkers, with the promise to donate profits to the NHS charity, to then only make 20 so they're not actually really having to donate anything but still taking all the kudos - granted a donation is a donation and I can only commend any company/individual that supports the NHS as it's a wonderful thing, but it was clearly a marketing ploy over a genuine fundraising effort (add another East Sussex batmaker to that list too).

Can only imagine these limited editions are pi**ing off the retailers who have stood by their sides for so many years, I know I'd be annoyed if I was in a retailers' boots.

ch1p · « **Reply #47 on:** December 03, 2020, 09:03:22 AM »

Yeah, I don�t really get the 20 bat thing. Although, excuse my ignorance and this is just me assuming. But, would it really cost them that much to instruct the india factory to include 20 of each bat (delta and blue maxx) in the next shipment over to the UK instead of 20 of XX range. I believe the factory already produce those models for the Indian market? So it�s just a black stamp instead of a red stamp on the edge.

Then in terms of marketing etc, again assuming. But wouldn�t they have an employee/hire an agency to do the marketing for them so it�s just a task on the list instead of them twiddling their thumbs in the off season? I could be way off the mark and don�t work for gray nics so this could all be rubbish please bear that in mind 🤣

Personally all the marketing rubbish is what has put me off them in recent years. I think I�ve ranted before that the �tailender� just looked like ugly powespot�s that hadn�t sold and we�re restickered with a red spot and �marketed� up. Again I could be well wrong but at least that�s what it felt like.

On topic - Babar is a great signing IMO. Arguably now in the top 4 along with Kohli, Smith, Williamson or at least getting near it. He plays a lot of cricket throughout the year in all three formats and will have some time with Somerset most years I imagine. Think it�s not just about breaking into the Pakistan market but there are vast amounts of Pakistanis who love the game in the UK who I would�ve thought it would be worth tapping into.

Neon Cricket · « **Reply #48 on:** December 03, 2020, 09:10:40 AM »

Quote from: ch1p on December 03, 2020, 09:03:22 AM

Yeah, I don�t really get the 20 bat thing. Although, excuse my ignorance and this is just me assuming. But, would it really cost them that much to instruct the india factory to include 20 of each bat (delta and blue maxx) in the next shipment over to the UK instead of 20 of XX range. I believe the factory already produce those models for the Indian market? So it�s just a black stamp instead of a red stamp on the edge.

Then in terms of marketing etc, again assuming. But wouldn�t they have an employee/hire an agency to do the marketing for them so it�s just a task on the list instead of them twiddling their thumbs in the off season? I could be way off the mark and don�t work for gray nics so this could all be rubbish please bear that in mind 🤣

Personally all the marketing rubbish is what has put me off them in recent years. I think I�ve ranted before that the �tailender� just looked like ugly powespot�s that hadn�t sold and we�re restickered with a red spot and �marketed� up. Again I could be well wrong but at least that�s what it felt like.

On topic - Babar is a great signing IMO. Arguably now in the top 4 along with Kohli, Smith, Williamson or at least getting near it. He plays a lot of cricket throughout the year in all three formats and will have some time with Somerset most years I imagine. Think it�s not just about breaking into the Pakistan market but there are vast amounts of Pakistanis who love the game in the UK who I would�ve thought it would be worth tapping into.

Yeah exactly @ch1p, getting more than 20 sent over wouldn't take much doing at all.

They'll have an in-house marketing guy/team (Grays as a whole is obviously far bigger than just GN), but even so it's still time spent they could've done something actually financially beneficial - although that's just my opinion as a project manager in the 'day job', so I'm far more analytical of stuff like that than most.

Jimbo · « **Reply #49 on:** December 03, 2020, 09:18:56 AM »

20 NHS bats is a pretty canny bit of PR work. Very little work but it was plastered all over social media and their mailing lists.

The Delta 20 bats one is interesting, wouldn't be shocked if they started doing similar very limited runs of bats just to keep interest ticking over in the UK off season.

SOULMAN1012 · « **Reply #50 on:** December 03, 2020, 09:47:18 AM »

The nhs bat was the original supernova shape with the. Exact same sticker design and also at the �150 price point It could well be they are restickered bats from that range as they have a lot of them on the outlet page on eBay. I also believe they did this with the Kronos bat a year or so ago as a limited run. Now again i could be well off the mark but that�s by guess.

As for retailers iv i was a smaller retailer yes i would be very annoyed that GN are not apparently supporting the retailers by even limiting those to a select few retailers given the season they would have had. The NHS bat was 20 at �150 so �3000 and the delta is 20 at �8000 so I cant see �11k being a big attraction to GN but I guess it helps shift a bundle of bits over the quieter time of year.

They do seem to be focusing on the Australian market a lot more with the retro bats as we have seen the return of the Ultimate and the Powerspot with the original sticker designs were as the UK has remodelled versions in the last few years

Six Sixes Cricket · « **Reply #51 on:** December 03, 2020, 12:31:17 PM »

Australian gn is a separately ran business to gray nics uk

Author Topic: Babar Azam joins Gray Nicolls (Read 10563 times)

brokenbat

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Neon Cricket

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ch1p

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Neon Cricket

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Jimbo

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SOULMAN1012

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Six Sixes Cricket

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