Saturday, August 30, 2008

Saving Houston

I wish that I had the $10M necessary to make sure the Comets remain in Houston. I don't, but it started me thinking about who the peers of the Storm's owners might be down in the Houston area. Of course that started me thinking about what major companies are headquarted in Houston. Suddenly, I had one of those oh, duh, moments. I felt like Homer Simpson uttering a big "Doh!"

The former naming rights owner of the Comets original stadium, the Compaq center is right smack in the heart of the Houston business community under it's current name of HP. HP also just merged with another huge Texas giant, EDS. Two of the Storm's owners are associated with Microsoft and are sure to have links to their peers at HP, a company known for housing a number of high powered women leaders. Perhaps a little networking on their part could dig up some candidate owners in a similar position in the Houston area that would be willing to show the same sort of support that the Storm owners have shown.

In the past HP has been an advertiser for the NBA and the WNBA, with ownership that included HP employees, a new sponsor could be found. There could be a wealth of strong co-marketing and philanthropic ventures that could be established. HP encourages growth of women leaders in business and the NCAA has great data on how sports for girls and women creates future leaders in the business world. It could be a match made in heaven. Sadly, I live too far down on the food chain to have the kind of networking contacts to explore something like this. I strongly suspect that Dawn Trudeau and Lisa Brummel have that reach from their Microsoft lives, however.

I think it would be a fantastic story if not only did these women help save the Storm, but helped build a bridge to save the Comets as well.

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