Notes: UFC branding machine marches on

The latest extension of the Ultimate Fighting Championship brand came Saturday with the grand opening of the first of what is expected to become a large chain of UFC Gyms, with the first location in Concord, Calif., in the San Francisco Bay area.

The UFC Gym idea came from a series of meetings about 18 months ago between UFC president Dana White, CEO Lorenzo Fertitta, and Mark Mastrov and Jim Rowley, the founder and former division president respectively for 24 Hour Fitness, who had both left the company and to start their own new ventures, opening gyms like YogaWorks, Crunch and Steve Nash Fitness World.

The result is a merger of the 24 Hour Fitness-type of gym with a traditional martial arts gym. The gym features the traditional assortment of weights, treadmills, exercise bikes and other aerobic equipment, along with television monitors and blaring music. But the major differences are the obvious UFC trappings. An Octagon in the center of gym is used for martial arts classes. Huge wall photos of UFC Hall of Famers and life-sized cardboard cutouts of current stars decorate the interiors.

The gym also features the type of training equipment that fighters use, like various punching bags, to more esoteric equipment like the sledge hammers and tires that have been featured in the training videos of MMA fighters.

There are obvious marketing benefits to UFC, in particular another aspect of mainstreaming the brand name, which even with its huge gains in popularity over the past five years, still largely appeals to adult males between the ages of 18-45. It also is another way of breaking down whatever negative stigmas exist by making the brand name part of communities and marketing the fighters as larger-than-life stars to families. It also creates new venues to market the company's stars and major events, as part of the concept includes regular personal appearances by fighters at the gyms.

"UFC Gyms are going to shake up the fitness industry the way UFC shook up the sports industry," White, who, along with fighters like Chuck Liddell, Brandon Vera, Josh Koscheck, Jon Fitch, Cain Velasquez, Mike Swick and Octagon girl Arianny Celeste were at the grand opening. "All the energy and excitement that we have brought to the fight business, we are now going to bring to the fitness business. There is going to be something for everybody at all levels, from first timers to world class athletes, we're going to get people excited and motivated to work out and get in great shape."

Concord was chosen for the first location because Mastrov and Rowley live in the area. The next few months will be about trial and error, finding out what works and what doesn't, with the idea of replicating the success to new locations. The goal is to open 10 locations before year's end, with the next facility scheduled to open in a few months in Rosemead, Calif., near Los Angeles.

One of the marketing concepts is to use the names of major star fighters in their home areas, such as the plans for a Georges St. Pierre UFC Gym in Montreal and a B.J. Penn UFC Gym in Honolulu. At the opening press conference, Liddell was teased about the idea of maybe doing a Liddell-named gym.

Thus far the signs have been encouraging. The gym has actually been open for business for seven weeks, and Rowley said they have already signed up 4,000 members before the grand opening.

"Our goal was 7,000 to 8,000 in the first year, and we'll easily beat it," he said. "We've opened up gyms all over the world and this is in the top-five percent."

By the end of the day Saturday, which featured autograph sessions with the fighters and martial arts demonstrations by the kids classes, approximately 10,000 people had come through the doors. Many were the type of adult males you'd expect to see at a live UFC event, but there were a number of adults bringing young children. Mastrov noted it was the highest turnout for any gym grand opening in his 26 years in the industry.

UFC lines up Versus debut

Another change in the UFC landscape for 2010 is the addition of a second English-language U.S. cable television deal with Versus, which will continue its relationship with UFC sister company World Extreme Cagefighting.

The new deal will include two live television specials, the first on March 21 in Broomfield, Colo. The top matches will be rising star Jon Jones (9-1) vs. Brandon Vera (11-4), who just came off losing a controversial decision to Randy Couture on Nov. 14 in Manchester, U.K.

Jones actually lost his last fight via disqualification to Matt Hamill on Dec. 5 in Las Vegas, but it was a fight Jones dominated and Hamill was on the verge of losing when Jones threw illegal elbows to the face. The co-main event has heavyweight Junior Dos Santos (10-1) facing Gabriel Gonzaga (11-4).

Versus is currently seen in 65 million homes, as compared to 99 million homes for Spike TV, UFC's flagship network. Its penetration dropped from 75 million homes one year ago after being dropped by DirecTV due to the sides being unable to come to an agreement on carriage charges.

The relationship debuts on Feb. 3, when the Countdown to UFC 109 special airs at 11 p.m. ET.

Versus executive vice president Marc Fein noted the new deal will include all the Countdown specials, which will air on Versus after they debut on Spike.

The station will continue to be the home of WEC, with plans for seven live events in 2010, as well as 10 one-hour new "Wrekcage" shows featuring taped fights, as well as "Best Knockout" specials and the popular, year-end specials airing the company's best matches of the year.

The deal could be a strong ground-floor opportunity, as with the Comcast/NBC Universal merger, there is talk the network will be built to be NBC's sports cable counter to ESPN.

UFC officials had noted the hope that by having higher profile events on the station, it will help build the base audience for the WEC events.

"With the UFC viewers watching, we can push WEC events and our other products," Fein said.

Fein said an advantage of Versus when it comes to live programming of both WEC and UFC is that they aren't going to be as strict on the time slot.

For example, when Strikeforce had its debut event on CBS, there was a panic backstage because the network affiliates wanted to show to end at 11 p.m. ET because of the scheduled local newscasts. For Spike, the live UFC specials are usually there to build an audience for Spike to debut a series, so they want the new show being showcased to start as close to its advertised time as possible. Fein said if there is a great match on the undercard, they won't have qualms about the show going well past the scheduled time slot to fit it in.