The Dallas-based agency has entered into an exclusive licensing agreement with IMG Worldwide to operate the iconic Dave Campbell’s Texas Football brand and sell sponsorships for Texas’ University Interscholastic League (UIL) public high school sports properties. Sport in Action will likewise oversee games assets of the 109th annual Red River Rivalry under a consultative agreement with IMG. Veteran IMG executive Adam Hochfelder will serve as President and Drayton McLane III will be Chairman of the Board. IMG will continue to hold ownership in the brand.
McLane Group is the majority owner of Sports in Action. Chairman, Drayton McLane Jr., grew a small family business, McLane Company, into a multi-billion dollar enterprise and formed the Temple, Texas-based holding company, owned and operated by the McLane family. Drayton McLane III is also CEO of Classic Foods, part of the McLane Group of Companies.
“What really interested us is the strong brand name of Dave Campbell’s Texas Football. For many people, buying their copy of the DCTF summer edition is a big event for their year. It signals that the hot days of summer are almost done and high school and college football is around the corner, “ said Drayton McLane Jr., Chairman of McLane Group. “Along with the brand name, the strong team that Adam has in place, and a growing population in Texas, we feel this licensing agreement has unlimited opportunities for growth.”
Hochfelder is a 10-year veteran of the sports marketing industry, most recently heading up a team of six professionals managing various IMG sports assets from its Dallas office. Since 2005, Hochfelder has run the Dave Campbell’s Texas Football franchise as its executive director, as well as the AT&T Red River Rivalry. He has likewise overseen IMG’s relationship with UIL sports programs since 2006.
“I am thrilled to bring control of the iconic Dave Campbell’s brand back to the Lone Star State,” said Hochfelder. “I couldn’t ask for better partners to model our growth after than a Texas-based, family-owned business with a rich background in sports like the McLane Group. Each of the properties with which we have been entrusted has a proud Texas heritage, just like the McLane family, and we believe their prospects for the future are brighter that ever.”
The Magazine’s Founder and Editor-in-Chief Dave Campbell also voiced his excitement over the transition.
“Texas Football Magazine is coming home, and I could not be more delighted,” Mr. Campbell said. “Texas Football in my opinion is in a great position for growth.”
Additional business interests and consultative projects will operate under Sports in Action, which will concentrate on sports-related marketing. High Field Marketing, an operating entity, will focus on non-sports events and brand names. Hochfelder has brought along his entire team from IMG to staff the new agency.
About McLane Group
Founded by Drayton McLane Jr. in 1990, The McLane Group is a holding company comprised of a variety of diverse enterprises that demonstrate a tradition of excellence and innovation established more than a century ago with the McLane Company, a wholesale grocery distributor (1894-1990). A few of the McLane Group companies include McLane Advanced Technologies, IT solutions for federal, state, and commercial entities (2004-present); McLane Intelligent Solutions, managed IT services (2005-present); Classic Foods, kettle cooked foods (1992-present); and the Houston Astros Baseball Club (1992-2011). For more information, please visit www.mclanegroup.com
About the Dave Campbell Franchise
Introduced in 1960, Dave Campbell’s Texas Football is the only publication to preview every team in Texas, from the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans through every level of college football and the roughly 1,400 public and private high schools in the state that field football teams. The annual magazine known as “The Bible of Texas Football” is issued each summer, prior to the start of the pre-season, and counts more than 400,000 loyal readers. Now well into his 80s, Dave Campbell remains the publication’s editor-in-chief.
Founded and published in Waco for its first 25 years, Dave Campbell’s Texas Football was sold in 1985 to him host of Lexington, Kentucky. For a number of years the magazine headquarters remained in Texas, but eventually Texas Football was acquired by IMG, a billion-dollar company with headquarters in New York.
The Dave Campbell franchise included the Texasfootball.com website, the statewide radio program Dave Campbell’s Texas Football Radio Hour, the Texas Football Game Day television program broadcast by Fox Sports Southwest and the Texas Football Classic, a high school football event held at the beginning of each season at San Antonio’s Alamodome.
The AT&T Red River Rivalry, held annually in Dallas’ iconic Cotton Bowl at Fair Park, features one of the greatest rivalries in American sports. Also known as the Red River Shootout, the event pits the University of Texas Longhorns against the University of Oklahoma Sooners in one of college football’s most-anticipated games each season.
The University Interscholastic League (UIL) was created by the University of Texas at Austin to provide leadership and guidance to public school debate and athletic teachers. Since 1910, the UIL has grown into the largest inter-school organization of its kind in the world.