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In the lead-up to a rivalry game between Colorado and Colorado State last September, CSU coach Jay Norvell took a shot at CU coach Deion Sanders. “When I talk to grown-ups, I take my hat and my glasses off,” Norvell said. “That’s what my mother taught me.”
The comments did much more than just fuel the tension for the game, in which the Buffaloes ultimately bested the Rams 43–35 in double overtime: They also helped launch a multimillion-dollar viral sunglasses campaign.
The Sanders sunglasses campaign was underway well before Norvell’s comments, according to Constance Schwartz-Morini, the CEO of SMAC Entertainment, which represents Sanders in off-field deals. Sanders had already teamed up with Blenders Eyewear and was working on his own line—but the product wasn’t slated to launch until that November.
But when Norvell attacked Sanders for his indoor shades, Schwartz-Morini and the SMAC team kicked into high gear. “Deion’s mom didn’t appreciate that too much,” Schwartz-Morini said onstage Friday at the Front Office Sports Huddle in the Hamptons event. “But when Coach Norvell decided to take a shot at Deion’s mom, we literally said, ‘Get the factories going. We’re going to launch these sunglasses this week.’”
Sanders gave a pair to every player on the team, and he wore the sunglasses on ESPN’s College GameDay and Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff, as both college football pregame shows were in Boulder that week. He even brought pairs for the hosts and analysts on the show.
The campaign was wildly successful, prompting between 67,000 and 72,000 presales in less than a week, FOS reported last year—and raking in estimated revenues of around $4.5 million. This year, the sunglasses line will launch a slate of new products.
“I would love to sit back and pretend like, ‘Hey, this is like, how you launch a brand,’” Schwartz-Morini said. “We had no clue.”
But she added: “We’re so thankful to Coach Norvell for running his mouth against Coach [Sanders], because it just really took us to another stratosphere with the glasses.”
