QuidelOrtho President and CEO Doug Bryant says partnering with sports teams has increased brand awareness and benefited local communities in outreach initiatives.
Strategic partnerships are beneficial to companies within the medical device industry because they increase brand recognition and provide marketing opportunities. QuidelOrtho began partnering with professional and collegiate sports teams during the COVID-19 pandemic with the goal of increasing its brand recognition. While QuidelOrtho’s partnerships with sports teams are not necessarily a “traditional” medical industry partnership, together, QuidelOrtho and the sports teams have increased visibility while positively impacting surrounding communities.
QuidelOrtho provides innovative medical diagnostic testing that allows patients, clinicians, and communities to accurately diagnose patients, spot health trends, and respond quickly in healthcare settings. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, QuidelOrtho was an early provider of rapid antigen tests with its Sofia® Analyzer technology. This diagnostic testing technology is able to quickly and accurately deliver clinical test results.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, QuidelOrtho began engaging in strategic partnerships with sports teams. During the 2020 baseball season, San Diego Padres CEO Erik Greupner wanted to find a way during a time of high COVID-19 transmission for staff and coaches to safely return to work during a time of high COVID-19 transmission. QuidelOrtho employed the Sofia technology to allow the Padres staff and Petco park employees to return to work by testing employees for COVID-19.
When the State of California began allowing limited fan attendance in stadiums with proof of a negative COVID-19 test, QuidelOrtho established testing programs for Padres fans. Together with the Padres, QuidelOrtho implemented a “Safe at Home” fan testing program and equipped the stadium with two Sofia Analyzer stations right outside of Petco Park, the home of the San Diego Padres.
The ability to be tested for COVID-19 in the stadium enabled fans to watch the games with limited attendance throughout the pandemic.
QuidelOrtho went on to negotiate a multi-year agreement with the San Diego Padres that included increased QuidelOrtho marketing assets, employee hospitality programs, and a program that provided test kits to the Padres staff and Petco park employees.
Community benefit of partnerships
For QuidelOrtho, it was important during the COVID-19 pandemic and going forward to not just partner with other companies to achieve business goals, but to ensure that together, they were making a positive impact on surrounding communities while achieving business goals.
When QuidelOrtho began partnering with sports teams, they made sure that the teams it worked with were giving back to the community and outside of sports as well. For example, QuidelOrtho partnered with the University of Washington to monitor Pac-12 collegiate athletes who had been previously infected with the coronavirus. The university’s research aimed to find possible links between the virus and the deadly heart condition myocarditis.
“We wanted to make sure that anybody that partnered with us had something good that they were trying to accomplish outside of just giving back to sports,” said Bryant.
From there, QuidelOrtho partnered with collegiate sports teams including Notre Dame University and San Diego State University (SDSU). At SDSU, QuidelOrtho allocated funding to the development of a research corridor on campus and became an official diagnostics partner of the university’s athletes. QuidelOrtho logos are featured on the entrance gates to the SDSU stadium.
Many major sports organizations reached out to inquire about potential partnerships with the diagnostic company, and according to Bryant, “It started to mushroom a little bit, and our communications group gets numerous calls on a daily and weekly basis. I think we’ve been contacted by almost every major sports organization, including the British Premier League, nearly every team in the NFL, and every team in baseball.”
QuidelOrtho has benefitted from engagement in research funding for reasons beyond brand awareness and recognition. By partnering with the New York Jets, QuidelOrtho was able to assist the surrounding New York and New Jersey communities to help people who were greatly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The partnership with the Jets includes marketing in arena settings, digital brand activations, and employee hospitality opportunities for QuidelOrtho, while also emphasizing community engagement. At the end of 2021, QuidelOrtho partnered with the Jets and United Way to distribute at-home COVID-19 tests to underserved communities in New Jersey at a time when these tests were in extremely high demand.
Marketing for good
The QuidelOrtho partnership with the Jets has been a very successful investment for company advertising and awareness. As a key sponsor of the team, any time a player, coach, or staff member is interviewed on TV, the QuidelOrtho logo is displayed in the background of the interview. When the 2023 team was announced, and Quarterback Aaron Rodgers joined the Jets, the QuidelOrtho logo was featured and visible to all viewers, generating millions of media dollars in terms of value and creating a great deal of brand awareness.
“The Jets season announcement with the QuidelOrtho press backdrop is the number one digital event in the Jets’ history and the most viewed video across all NFL clubs in 2023. Our desire to do good for communities and partner with companies that truly want to be partners inadvertently created an unbelievable branding event for us as well,” said Bryant.
Additionally, a partnership with the Chicago Blackhawks brought advertising success for QuidelOrtho and philanthropic assistance to the city of Chicago. The partnership generated increased media impressions and supported hockey clinics for underprivileged youth.
“Our logo on the digital dashboards of the Chicago Blackhawks games has generated nearly 64 million impressions, while our dedication to the community of Chicago has provided tremendous support for inner city hockey clinics,” according to Bryant.
Sports partnership industry impact
The COVID-19 pandemic changed the way that the world approaches health. The public looks at community health differently because of the pandemic. Many people now recognize the necessity of getting a diagnostic test for illnesses such as influenza, strep, and COVID-19, so they can take necessary precautions and avoid public transmission.
“What we’ve done as a company with sports partnerships has been extremely beneficial at a time when the country needed something like this. There’s been a paradigm shift in the way we all, as individuals, think about our healthcare and about our ability to control healthcare for not only ourselves but our families,” said Bryant.
QuidelOrtho also made an impact on the medical industry at large through their strategic partnerships by donating millions of [COVID-19?] tests to the National Institutes of Health (NIH). These tests will be used by the NIH in research studies.
Diagnostic testing is a part of the solution to closing healthcare access and equity gaps in the U.S., according to Bryant. It is important to properly address patients’ health concerns through diagnostic testing so that patients from all backgrounds can receive proper treatment.
“We’ve created awareness of the value of diagnostics, and I think QuidelOrtho has shown the value our industry offers in providing healthcare to communities across the nation,” said Bryant. “It’s not just important that we did this for our company, it’s important that we did this for the diagnostics industry overall.”