Rugby hero’s marketability just adds up

IN sport, when you hang up your boots it is hard to hang on to your marketability.

Sponsors specialise in emulation, they know if their clients excel on the pitch, off it, consumers will want to ape them.

However, once a player retires, they tend to slip from the public consciousness; perhaps they will open a pub or get a few years on the after-dinner circuit but, in terms of marketing firepower, they are the old gunslingers vanishing into the shadows as the young guns take over.

Unless you are Keith Gerard Mallinson Wood.

The ex-rugby star is one smart cookie. Not just because of the Honorary Doctorate of Science he was conferred with yesterday, or the maths degree he received in the early 1990s, but because he remains an A-List operator in a B-List world.

Wood was the figurehead of Irish rugby for the best part of a decade, 58 caps, three World Cups and two Lions tours bear testament to his world class abilities while his intelligence, sharp wit and distinctive bald pate branded his image onto the minds of the Irish public.

That image did not dull when he retired after last autumn’s World Cup in Australia. Wood was a prominent member of the BBC’s 2004 Six Nations coverage, continues to run a successful PR company and is constantly approached to endorse such wholesome products as Dawn Omega milk.

“Wood is a larger than life personality and has an easily identifiable image. It may not be the type of boy-band look that works for David Beckham or Jonny Wilkinson but the bald head and twinkle in the eye are big winners in marketing terms,” says PR consultant Máire Scully.

“It is rare for an ex-player to survive as a marketing entity; another example would be soccer star Gary Lineker who has a very high TV profile and has used his goody-boy image very successfully in his work with Walker’s Crisps.”

Ex-England hooker Brian Moore was a qualified solicitor when he retired from rugby in 1995, he now works as a BBC analyst and has a successful career in commercial litigation. Moore has strong views on the limited opportunities facing the majority of ex-players.

“Professionalism has created difficulties. Of the recent crop in England, only Lawrence Dallaglio, Jonny Wilkinson and Martin Johnson will never have to work again,” says Moore.

“There is a whole raft of players who are not high profile enough to live off their playing careers. Can you imagine them going for a job at 34? ‘What have you done since your degree when you were 20?’, ‘Eh, I played rugby’.”

Top names can be very successful after they retire but it is the current stars like Gordon D’Arcy and Brian O’Driscoll who are really raking it in.

“An ex-player opening a store or speaking at a dinner could charge €1,000 to €3,000 depending on their profile,” says Nora Lawton of Wilson Hartnell PR.

“But someone like D’Arcy or O’Driscoll can basically name their price. In fact, it is widely said that Brian O’Driscoll put a clause in his current IRFU contract whereby he has to wear the number 13 jersey at all times because it ties in with his Powerade sponsor ship.

“The likes of Wood and Mick Galwey are exceptions to the ex-players rule, Wood can command decent money for product endorsements and other activities because he represents value for money,” added Lawton.

As for the man himself, Wood reckons it is just as well his rugby career has secured his retirement.

“My degree in maths is no good to me because I have been kicked in the head so many times, I can’t even add up,” said the Clare man.