How much does it cost to have the Final Four in Indy?

Mark Alesia

mark.alesia@indystar.com

The men's Final Four comes to town this weekend, with a great story line in undefeated Kentucky, attractive teams and soaring television ratings.

Tens of thousands of people from out of state will spend money that wouldn't otherwise be spent in and around Indianapolis. It likely means Indy's television exposure will be more valuable because of a larger TV audience.

But while the city throws a party for basketball, the price of being a sports city is going up.

"Having been in the business for 21 years, that is a market where the competitive dynamics have changed," said Leonard Hoops, president of Visit Indy. "The sporting events themselves have better understood the potential value of their asset and the interest it draws from destinations around the country. So they've gone in and said, 'Well, if you want us to be in your city, here's what we want.' "

And in the case of the minimum bid requirements for this Final Four — obtained by The Indianapolis Star from a party involved in the process — the NCAA tells cities they're encouraged to provide "enhancements" to those minimums.

By that, the bid document says, cities can show "a commitment ... to forego, for the benefit of the NCAA, any portion of the revenue reserved to the (local event organizing committee)" and "offer additional forms of value to the NCAA."

It's impossible to tell how much it costs for Indianapolis to put on the Final Four, and the amount of public money involved, because of secrecy surrounding bids for major sports events.

"I'm not trying to be a jerk," said Ryan Vaughn, president of the Indiana Sports Corp., which organizes Indy's bids for major sports events and coordinates the work as host city. "I just don't want to give up our competitive advantage and our relationships."

But there are clues to the money involved.

Multimillion-dollar show

Texas has a Major Events Fund to apply tax money toward sports events.

Getting the money requires itemizing expenses. Public records show that last year's men's Final Four in the Dallas area cost $10.7 million in state and local tax money. That included everything from $320 for the shot clock operator to $29,041 for cancellation insurance to $76,636 for police escorts.

Because of Indy's compact Downtown, officials said, the bill is less here.

In November, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution obtained bid documents that showed up to $8.5 million in public money being used for the 2020 Final Four.

That included $3.15 million for stadium expenses and $3.33 million for the fan festival and concerts.

The money comes from a 1 percent increase in the city's hotel-motel tax. The head of the city's visitors bureau told the newspaper that "one of the beauties of this model" is the money comes mostly from out-of-state people.

That is the argument Vaughn makes for Indy.

"The industry becomes self-sustaining or self-perpetuating by virtue of the fact that it's visitors and folks who come here driving the revenue that supports the event," Vaughn said.

It's a lot of tax money.

The Capital Improvement Board took in almost $143 million in 2013 from a variety of taxes, including hotels, rental cars, food and beverage. The CIB uses the money to pay for Lucas Oil Stadium and the Indiana Convention Center and their operation. (The Pacers operate Bankers Life Fieldhouse, although the CIB pays the expenses.)

There is still debt on the old RCA Dome that isn't scheduled to be paid off until 2021. The stadium was demolished in 2008. That debt of about $43 million is combined with improvements and debt refinancing for the convention center, according to the CIB.

Taxpayers paid for at least $620 million of the $720 million to build Lucas Oil Stadium, site of the Final Four.

The CIB uses its tax money to fund Visit Indy, the tourism bureau, whose primary role in the Final Four bid was to secure hotel rooms for the best price possible. It also works on space needs at the convention center and markets Indy as a tourist destination.

Indiana public records law allows the CIB to redact the essential parts of contracts, such as the one with the NCAA for use of the convention center for its fan festival.

Vaughn said that when the Sports Corp. bids on events, "We're raising that from private corporations or individual donors who see value in attracting the event for them."

The Sports Corp. is a tax-exempt organization. Its latest tax filing shows revenue of $4.6 million, including $350,000 in "government grants," $400,000 in membership dues and $1.2 million in contributions.

The Final Four, Vaughn said, is "certainly a multimillion-dollar event expense, for sure. Whether it's $10.7 million (like Texas), I don't think so."

In relative terms, the Indianapolis host committee for the Super Bowl said it raised about $25 million from corporate and private donors to pay a wide array of expenses.

Visit Indy estimates that the Final Four will have an economic impact of $71 million. That's based on an "economic impact calculator" developed for Indy by Rockport Analytics.

Sports economist Brad Humphreys of the University of West Virginia said he couldn't do a precise analysis without looking at the methodology. But he said the economic impact number is "almost certainly overstated."

A city that delivers

Mark Lewis, NCAA executive vice president, said every Final Four city is different for assessing bids.

There are publicly owned stadiums and privately owned stadiums. There are different amounts of public money and private money involved.

"For us, the key is, we need to have a city and organization structure that can deliver," Lewis said. "Indianapolis is one of the best at that."

According to the NCAA bid document obtained by The Star, the NCAA keeps ticket money and controls at least half of the luxury suites, including all suites above the length of the basketball court. The NCAA keeps money from programs and souvenirs. It gets 325 parking spaces at the stadium.

The local organizers pay for security and crowd control at Lucas Oil Stadium, the fan festival and music festival. Same for fire and medical personnel.

The venue keeps parking and concessions money. The NCAA provides the "basketbowl" seating and pays to set it up.

Lewis said the convention center space for the fan fest is free, but corporate sponsors pay for their own attractions. Indy also had to provide space for the National Association of Basketball Coaches convention trade show and the use of Old National Centre for Thursday night's Final Four Salute program.

The NCAA receives the large majority of its money from the men's basketball tournament. Most of that money is distributed to member schools in direct payments and services.

Lewis said the group doesn't try to squeeze every penny it can out of host cities.

The three-day March Madness Musical Festival, for example, is free to the public and has corporate sponsors that pay for the bands. As for the space for a concert, the stage, the fencing, the portable toilets ... cities might choose to provide that as part of their bid.

"We always want to make sure we're asking people to compete for (the Final Four)," Lewis said, "but not leave a bad taste in their mouth."

Call Star reporter Mark Alesia at (317) 444-6311. Follow him on Twitter:@markalesia.

Final Four proves Phoenix is a basketball town: 7 for 2017

Jerry Colangelo, AZ I See It

Editor's Note: The Republic asked Valley leaders to share their take on events that will happen in 2017, including the NCAA Final Four Tournament that will be held at University of Phoenix Stadium April 1 and 3.

Upon arriving in Phoenix almost 50 years ago, it was unimaginable for me to think that one day the NCAA Final Four Tournament would be held here in the Valley.

And back then, who would have even cared? Though ASU had a nice run under legendary coach Ned Wulk in the '60s and '70s, interest in basketball throughout the Valley was pretty limited. Even after the Phoenix Suns made their NBA debut in 1968, fan interest was marginal. Most people attending our games at Veterans Memorial Coliseum were only there to watch and cheer their team – the visiting team!

Arizona at pinnacle of March Madness

Speed forward all these years later and Arizona joins just 21 other states to have ever hosted this iconic sporting spectacle. And today there are only nine venues in America that even meet the NCAA criteria for hosting this prestigious 87-year-old tournament. Fortunately for us, University of Phoenix Stadium is one of them.

This spring, “March Madness” will culminate here in Valley, and basketball fans from around the world will be watching. Dateline Glendale — and the larger metropolitan Phoenix area — will enjoy hundreds of millions of dollars in media exposure as 90-plus million fans will watch on television. Many others will watch the games online and all of this exposure will ultimately be a huge boost for Arizona tourism. The immediate benefits are also tremendous as last year more than 100,000 fans traveled to Houston for the game or weekend festivities and the city benefited from $300 million in direct economic impact.

There are also significant benefits for our community as the NCAA Legacy Restoration Project will rebuild Harmon Park in downtown Phoenix. For years this park has been a hotbed for professional and college players looking for a pickup game. And the kids watching ultimately become more than just spectators as they take up the game and get into youth leagues … and off the streets.

Who would've imagined ...

Phoenix will actually be the first western city to host a Final Four since 1995, and this is a testament to the incredible success of all the prior major sporting events that have been staged in the Valley. Three Super Bowls, multiple NBA and MLB All-Star Weekends, several NCAA National Championship football games and so many other sporting events have paved the way for our turn to host a Final Four. Our great weather and a legion of seasoned volunteers extending warm Arizona hospitality to visiting fans will ensure that the NCAA returns again and again.

BOIVIN: Your Final Four teams? Got 'em right here

Beyond the important economic benefits and significant media exposure that is generated by hosting “The Big Dance,” I suppose what I’m most excited about is how it works to further validate the Valley as a sports mecca. Again, I would have never imagined that Phoenix would be among the nation’s elite cities to host these signature sporting events, and I think we may sometimes take this for granted as other cities can’t boast of such trust and popularity.

On a more personal note, basketball has meant so very much to me as I first started dribbling a basketball at age 7. It ultimately afforded me the opportunity to attend the University of Illinois, where I played on a scholarship, and eventually led me into my first job with the expansion franchise Chicago Bulls. In turn that provided me and my family the opportunity to move to Phoenix and start an NBA expansion franchise — our beloved Phoenix Suns. The Suns and a tradition of basketball in the Valley then led to the start of the Phoenix Mercury franchise, which has resulted in multiple WNBA championships.

It’s fair to say that Phoenix is today an indisputable basketball town.

Cementing our basketball mecca status

Throughout my career, I have been privileged to be involved in numerous other basketball organizations, programs and activities and serve in a multitude of leadership roles.

I have been most honored to serve as chairman of USA Men’s and Women’s Basketball these past dozen years and help orchestrate our country’s return to world dominance in the sport, winning three consecutive gold medals. One day, I am hopeful that the USA Olympic Basketball Headquarters will actually relocate to the Valley, as that would only further validate us as a basketball mecca.

As chairman of the Board of Governors of Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame and a 2004 inductee into the hall, I am also working to place a west coast museum here as that too would help us attract future signature basketball events.

The sport of basketball has meant so very much to me and my family. As it turns out, it has also meant a great deal to the Valley of the Sun, helping transform us from a sleepy desert town into a true “major league” city.

Jerry Colangelo is a principal partner of JDM Partners LLC, a real estate development company, and a longtime sports executive. He was the first general manager of the Phoenix Suns and was managing general partner of the Arizona Diamondbacks. He is managing director of the USA Olympic Men’s Basketball Team.

Where is the 2024 Final Four? Future men's championships coming ...

The 2023 Final Four came to a close with UConn winning the national championship in dominant fashion over unlikely runner-up San Diego State, but it's never too early to look ahead to where it will settle in the future.

This year, the Final Four and championship were held at NRG Stadium in Houston, the third time the events have been held in the stadium and fourth time in the city.

But if you missed out on attending the title game this year, the next seven Final Four locations have already been determined, allowing college basketball fans to plan ahead. Here's what to know.

Want to buy NCAA men's national championship tickets? Here's what to know about going to the championship game

Follow the madness: Latest Men's NCAA Tournament College Basketball Scores and Schedules

Future Final Four locations: 2024 and beyond

Here is where and when the next seven Final Fours will be, up to 2030:

2024: Phoenix – State Farm Stadium, April 6 and 8

2025: San Antonio – Alamodome, April 5 and 7

2026: Indianapolis – Lucas Oil Stadium, April 4 and 6

2027: Detroit – Ford Field, April 3 and 5

2028: Las Vegas – Allegiant Stadium, April 1 and 3

2029: Indianapolis – Lucas Oil Stadium, March 31 and April 2

2030: North Texas – AT&T Stadium, April 6 and 8

What to know about future Final Four sites

All known future sites will be held in football stadiums, a tradition of holding the Final Four in larger stadiums that began in 1971 (Astrodome) and became an annual occurrence in 1997 (RCA Dome).

All of the future sites have already hosted a Final Four except for Allegiant Stadium, as 2028 will be the first time the Final Four will be played in Las Vegas and the state of Nevada.

Lucas Oil Stadium will also be hosting two Final Fours in a four-year span, which will make it the fifth time it will host the event. By 2029, the city of Indianapolis will have hosted 10 Final Fours, tying it with Kansas City for the most times hosting the college basketball finale.

Follow Jordan Mendoza on Twitter: @jordan_mendoza5.

One year out: Phoenix on the clock for NCAA 2024 men's Final Four

When the NCAA Final Four convenes in NRG Stadium in Houston this week there will be at least a dozen or so interested parties from Arizona on hand taking thorough notes.

The 2024 men's basketball championship is coming to State Farm Stadium, with Arizona State serving as the host institution. The field trip will be for local officials to gather information and exchange ideas with those doing the hosting honors this year.

"It might seem like a year is a long time but it goes by so fast and there is a lot to do," said Debbie Johnson, co-chair of the local organizing committee along with Tom Sadler, president and CEO of the Arizona Sports and Tourism Authority. "We're gearing up for what is going to be a very busy and exciting time."

Cities get plenty of lead time when it comes to preparing for the undertaking. The right to host the event was awarded to Phoenix in July of 2018, a year after the Final Four was played here for the first time. Future Final Fours have been decided through 2030: San Antonio in 2025, Indianapolis (2026), Detroit (2027), Las Vegas (2028), Indianapolis again (2029) and Dallas (2030).

Greater Phoenix is no stranger to hosting major sporting events. Already this year, the VRBO Fiesta Bowl served as the site of a College Football Playoff semifinal between TCU and Michigan, and of course, just two months ago Super Bowl 57 between Kansas City and Philadelphia took place in Glendale.

While the basketball games — two national semifinals on Saturday, with the championship played Monday — will be the main attraction, the Final Four includes ancillary events, many of which will be open to the public at no charge.

In 2017 a three-day March Madness Music Festival drew a total of 135,000 enthusiasts to Hance Park, which reached capacity for the weekend events. The Final Four Fan Fest, sponsored by Capital One, drew 50,803 to the Phoenix Convention Center.

Johnson confirmed that those activities will likely be part of the agenda for next year's event, although they're still early in the planning stages. Both venues were key sites during Super Bowl 57.

The 2017 semifinal games, which featured Gonzaga vs. South Carolina and Oregon vs. North Carolina, drew 77,612, the second-largest crowd in State Farm Stadium history. The Final Four’s total attendance of 153,780, remains the second-highest in the event’s history.

"It's really about the student-athlete experience. We got a lot of great feedback on what we did the last time but of course, you always want to do more," said J.D. Loudabarger, ASU's associate athletic director for facilities and operations. "What that means and in what form that will come, we're not sure yet."

While the local group has the experience of having hosted before, Johnson said things could change drastically in just a few years and there is always more to be learned. That's why the Arizona contingent is in Houston this week despite having already hosted.

"Things are always evolving, whether that comes to something like security or logistics and the experience you're providing for the teams. You never stop learning or evolving as to things you can do better," she said.

When Glendale hosted in 2017 it was the first men's Final Four to be held west of Texas since 1995. The NCAA requires a minimum capacity of 70,000 to host the event and until recently few indoor venues in the west met that benchmark. Today, Arizona faces stiffer competition when it comes to bidding for major athletic events, most notably SoFi Stadium in greater Los Angeles and Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

SoFi, which seats 70,000 spectators but could accommodate up to 100,000 depending on the event, opened in the fall of 2020 and is home to the NFL's Rams and Chargers. It hosted Super Bowl 56 on Feb. 13, 2022, and was the site of College Football's most recent CFP championship game, in January. Next up for the venue is Wrestlemania 39 this weekend.

Previously in Glendale:What we learned when North Carolina beat Gonzaga for 2017 national title

Allegiant Stadium, which seats 65,000 but is expandable to 71,835, is home to the NFL's Raiders as well as the UNLV football team. It is also the site of the Pac-12 championship football game as well as the annual Las Vegas Bowl, which in 2021 featured Arizona State against Wisconsin. It opened in July 2020. The stadium will host next year's Super Bowl, the first to be played in Las Vegas.

Not only are these events good publicity for the state, but they also generate significant revenue. The 2017 Final Four generated an estimated economic impact of $324.5 million, according to a study by ASU's WP Carey School of Business.

Exposure can also bring in future dollars as well. The 2017 championship game between North Carolina and Gonzaga averaged nearly 23 million TV viewers. It was broadcast in 176 countries and was the first Final Four broadcast in Spanish. More than 2,200 media members were credentialed.

The last event was staffed by 3,332 local volunteers who logged a combined 29,736 hours. Johnson said a call for people who want to help will go out soon, and all are welcome, whether they want to volunteer for a few hours or can work multiple days.

Loudabarger said between 25 and 30 staff members from ASU are going to be directly involved with the event, their primary focus being what he called "running the floor," taking care of details such as the shot clock, game clock and scoreboard. ASU will also provide athletic training and medical staff which regularly works with its teams. ASU's marching band director, Jim Hudson, will serve as a liaison with the bands from the visiting schools.

"We have shown that we can hold major events here and it will be organized and everyone is going to have a good time," Johnson said. "If we didn't provide a great experience then they wouldn't keep coming back to us. We're looking forward to meeting that challenge again."

March Madness Elite 8 men's recap: Miami, SDSU earn Final Four ...

Indianapolis to host 2026 Final Four

INDIANAPOLIS — The NCAA announced Monday that Indianapolis will host the 2026 Men's Basketball Final Four at Lucas Oil Stadium. It will be the ninth time the city will host the event, including 2021. The 2026 event will take place April 4 and 6.

The nine Men’s Final Fours in Indianapolis would be second only to the 10 hosted in Kansas City. Indianapolis hosted the Men's Final Four in 1980 at Market Square Arena, 1991, '97, 2000 and 2006 at the RCA Dome, and 2010 and '15 at Lucas Oil Stadium. The NCAA also announced that Houston (2023), Phoenix (2024) and San Antonio (2025) will also host Final Fours.

"We're just a great host city from an infrastructure standpoint," Indiana Sports Corp President Ryan Vaughn said. "We've got great hotel partners, great convention center. Unbelievable stadium."

Vaughn also mentioned how great the volunteers were in 2015 and he said that's what makes Indianapolis's bid successful.

"One of the key things that we're always mindful of, especially when you're competing to host an event for the ninth time, is that you never take it for granted," Vaughn said. "You're always trying to add some innovation to the event because we want to be a value add to the event just like we know the event is a value add to the community."

Vaughn said technology will be one major area where they will look to innovate for 2026.

The event will be hosted by the Horizon League and IUPUI. Indianapolis also bid on the 2024 Final Four.

The Final Four is just one of many NCAA Tournament events Indiana will host in upcoming years.

Terre Haute will host the Division I regional for men's and women's cross-country in 2018 and 2020, along with hosting the Division I championships in 2019. Evansville will host the Division 1 regional in 2021 for men's and women's cross country. Bloomington will host the men's and women's track and field Division 1 regional in 2022.

In addition to the Final Four, the Division III championship for men's basketball will be hosted in Fort Wayne 2019-2022 and Fort Wayne will also host a Division I regional for women's basketball in 2020.

From 2019 to 2021, Indiana will also host NCAA tournament events for women's rowing and golf, men's swimming, golf and lacrosse.

Indianapolis serves as the annual backup site for the Final Four. The men's basketball tournament generates more than 80 percent of the NCAA's money.

With men's Sweet 16 in Las Vegas, NCAA finally embraces Sin City ...

LAS VEGAS — Jim Livengood had a big idea.

The longtime athletics director at Washington State, Arizona and UNLV, Livengood had been living in Las Vegas since his retirement in 2013. Over time, he began to see that the NCAA was making a mistake by eschewing Sin City as a place to plant its flag with championship-level events.

“There were so many people (in college sports) who hadn’t been to Vegas in 25 years,” Livengood said. “They had no idea.”

In his view, Vegas had everything you’d want for a Final Four or college football national championship game: Lots of flights in and out, plentiful hotel space and endless options for food and entertainment. And with the NHL and NFL moving into town, sports venues were on the way that could compete with any in the country.

But the NCAA, as usual, was behind the times. A rule prohibiting NCAA championships being played in states where sports gambling was legal meant that there was no conceivable way for Vegas to host an NCAA basketball tournament.

The NCAA was so committed to the bit that former NCAA president Mark Emmert was among several sports executives deposed in a 2012 federal lawsuit challenging the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA), a law that made sports gambling illegal everywhere except Nevada.

“This is clearly a threat to the integrity of intercollegiate athletics,” Emmert said.

Those days, of course, are over. PASPA was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2018, and sports gambling is now legal either online or in a physical sports book in 33 states plus the District of Columbia.

In the wake of that decision, Livengood began to pitch an idea that he thought might help break the ice among some of his former colleagues in NCAA world: Bring the entire women’s Sweet 16 to Las Vegas as a trial run.

“That was part and parcel of just trying to get some traction on the idea that Vegas could deliver all the things that were needed,” he said.

WHO WILL MAKE FIRST FINAL FOUR?:Sweet 16 men's teams with best shot at first Final Four

SCHEDULE, RESULTS:Complete 2023 NCAA men's tournament schedule, results and times

Though it never came to fruition, the wheels started turning. NACDA, the professional association for athletics directors that Livengood had formerly been president of, moved its annual convention here. Then in 2018, he helped facilitate the NCAA men’s basketball committee summer meeting in Las Vegas, where members toured a still-under-construction Allegiant Stadium, where the Raiders have been playing since 2020.

“That opened a lot of windows,” Livengood said.

Becoming a hub for college sports

Fast-forward to 2023, and Las Vegas is now poised to be a hub for college sports with several NCAA events scheduled over the next several years, beginning with Thursday’s West Regional at T-Mobile Arena. From golf to bowling to hockey — the 2026 Frozen Four will also be held here — the NCAA logo will soon be as ubiquitous on the Las Vegas Strip as ads for celebrity chef restaurants and Cirque du Soleil shows.

It will all lead up to 2028, when the NCAA brings its crown jewel event, the men’s Final Four, here for the first (and probably not last) time.

“It was just getting over the stigma that it was Las Vegas,” Livengood said.

People can debate whether the spread of sports gambling has had a positive or negative effect on college sports, but realistically it never made a lot of sense for the NCAA to avoid one of America’s most travel-friendly cities for events that rely on tens of thousands of people flying in for a weekend.

The days of UNLV basketball players being photographed in a hot tub with the infamous Richard “The Fixer” Perry, who had been implicated in multiple point-shaving scandals, were long in the past.

If anything, that ugly incident — which helped lead to coach Jerry Tarkanian's resignation in 1992 — helped the industry modernize and become more vigilant about potential problems. While at UNLV, Livengood said he learned that there was a much closer eye on their athletes in the community than anything he had experienced in his previous stops.

And pragmatically, for all those years the NCAA was keeping Vegas at arm’s length, the wider basketball world was ingratiating itself more and more here through USA Basketball training camps, the NBA summer league, the Pac-12 moving more of its biggest events here and several youth travel tournaments coming every summer where college coaches evaluate prospects.

Arkansas freshman Jordan Walsh said he had played in Las Vegas “four or five times” in high school before returning with the Razorbacks for the Sweet 16.

"It's a nice place,” he said. “Not somewhere I’d want to live.”

For two of the teams here this weekend, this is nothing new. Both UCLA and Gonzaga play their conference tournaments here annually. They even played each other here, on this same floor, on Nov. 23, 2021.

"The atmosphere was crazy,” said Gonzaga junior Julian Strawther, who grew up here. “Vegas showed up and showed out. It was one of the biggest and most fun games I’ve ever been a part of. I feel like slowly over the last five years, everything is kind of rolling through town and we’re getting a lot of big events.”

For most of the players, it doesn’t particularly matter where these tournaments are held. Once they arrive, it’s all business leading up to tip-off.

But it's a big deal for the fans to have a true destination that they can get to easily from every corner of the country, which is why it always made sense to have Vegas as a regular stop in the rotation. That’s likely going to be true in the expanded College Football Playoff as well. Though no CFP championship game has been awarded here yet due to scheduling conflicts with the Consumer Electronics Show at that time of year, Vegas is expected to be heavily involved once the next round of bidding begins.

But for people like Livengood, who were advocating for the NCAA to embrace Las Vegas before it was popular, this weekend is an exciting time. College sports have been a big deal here for decades, and treating it as a taboo has long been an outdated and flawed notion.

“More than anything else, it was making people aware that Vegas wasn’t just this place where it was sports books and gambling, but understanding from a transportation, food and lodging, ease of getting around, all the facilities being built that you could do anything you wanted and get there easily,” he said. “It's going to be a fan favorite.”

Archive: NCAA apparently will reconsider host cities

Dana Hunsinger Benbow

dana.benbow@indystar.com

Note: This story originally was published Nov. 20, 2015:

Amid a national debate over civil rights protections based on sexual orientation, the Indianapolis-based NCAA apparently will reconsider sites already chosen to host its championships — including Indianapolis, the NCAA told The Indianapolis Star.

“We’ll continue to review current events in all cities bidding on NCAA championships and events, as well as cities that have already been named as future host sites, such as Indianapolis,” Bob Williams, NCAA senior vice president for communications, wrote in an email statement Nov. 12.

Requests to speak to NCAA leaders for more information were denied.

The NCAA statement about future and scheduled sites comes after Houston voters this month repealed an ordinance that banned discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation.

Among the Indianapolis events that could be in jeopardy is the NCAA’s richest showcase — the men’s basketball Final Four — slated to return to the city in 2021. The same event held here this year pumped an estimated $71 million into the local economy, according to Visit Indy. Indianapolis also is scheduled to host first- and second-round games in the 2017 men’s basketball tournament.

Indiana is currently in the opening round of a second battle over lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender LGBT rights, with Senate Republicans proposing statewide anti-discrimination protections, but with several significant exemptions.

NCAA vote: No Final Fours at sites without anti-discrimination laws

Houston will still host the men’s Final Four next year because “it takes years to plan and implement this world-class event,” Dan Gavitt, vice president of men's basketball championship, said in a statement. Likewise, the women’s Final Four in Indianapolis will go on as planned in April, the NCAA said.

But the NCAA’s refusal to consent to an interview leaves several questions unanswered:

• Is Indy’s 2021 men’s Final Four at risk because Indiana does not have a law protecting LGBT individuals from discrimination? Where does the NCAA stand on the new rights legislation proposed Tuesday by Indiana Senate Republicans?

• What is the lead time required for the NCAA to reject a tournament site it has already committed to? In 2014, the NCAA approved men’s Final Fours through 2021 in five states, only one of which has LGBT civil-rights protections.

• Will the organization automatically reject future bids from would-be hosts that don’t have LGBT anti-discrimination laws? Could this affect Indianapolis’ special relationship that has brought the men’s Final Four to the city every five years?

In his statement, the NCAA’s Williams wrote, that “There are many factors in a thorough bid process that the NCAA considers when determining what cities will host the Final Four, including but not limited to local, city and state laws and ordinances.”

Moving target in Indiana

Seven months ago, the state Legislature passed the “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” (RFRA), which some feared would allow businesses to refuse to serve same-sex couples. That came just days before the men’s Final Four was to start at Lucas Oil Stadium, and the NCAA’s president warned that his organization would examine Indiana’s new law “and how it might affect future events as well as our workforce."

"The NCAA national office and our members are deeply committed to providing an inclusive environment for all our events," president Mark Emmert said in a statement then. "We are especially concerned about how this legislation could affect our student-athletes and employees.”

A national uproar ensued over RFRA. Pressed by local business and civic and sports leaders to fix the legislation, GOP lawmakers adopted an amendment that would prevent services from being denied due to sexual orientation in communities with anti-discrimination laws in place. There are about a dozen such communities in Indiana.

After the change was passed, Emmert issued this statement: “We are very pleased the Indiana legislature is taking action to amend Senate Bill 101 so that it is clear individuals cannot be discriminated against. NCAA core values call for an environment that is inclusive and non-discriminatory for our student-athletes, membership, fans, staff and their families.”

NCAA joins group lobbying for LGBT rights

Now the debate has started anew in Indiana. Republican lawmakers on Tuesday introduced legislation that would protect gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people against discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations statewide.

But exemptions would allow:

• Religious-affiliated adoption agencies to reject prospective same-sex parents.

• Schools, employers and others to determine their own restroom policies for transgender people.

• Businesses with fewer than four employees to refuse wedding services to same-sex couples.

How will the NCAA deal with this new twist?

"That’s something the NCAA is going to have to look at," said Chris Paulsen, campaign manager of Freedom Indiana, a grass-roots advocacy group that supports LGBT rights. "People vote their conscience with their dollars. Holding events in cities that are welcoming to the LGBT community, it's a smart business move."

A note of caution

Others noted that social change takes time.

Allison Melangton, who was CEO of Indy's Super Bowl Host Committee that brought the 2012 Super Bowl here, doesn't recall any language in the bidding process that reflected a requirement for anti-discrimination laws.

"Certainly, the NFL would have brought it to our attention if they believed it was an issue in Indiana at the time even though it was not a specification in the bid," said Melangton, now a vice president at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. "We bid in 2008 and were held to 2008 standards by the NFL — so that is almost eight years ago and times have changed."

Since then, the NFL has acted upon the issue. In 2014, Arizona’s legislature passed its own RFRA legislation. The NFL hinted in a statement that if the measure became law, the state could lose the 2015 Super Bowl it was scheduled to host.

Gov. Jan Brewer vetoed the measure.

If sports organizations and leagues do start looking at such laws when they make decisions on where to have events, they should not do so rashly, said Richard McGowan, who teaches ethics at Butler University.

Laws aren't going to change overnight, he said, just as major sporting events can't be moved overnight.

"Time is a factor and we live in a compressed society, but think about how long Martin Luther King Jr. worked to get civil rights (for African Americans)," he said. "There is a needed sense of patience and working through things with time."

Sports can help bring about that change, maybe even speed it, said Hudson Taylor, a wrestling coach at Columbia University, a straight activist for LGBT rights and the founder of Athlete Ally, an organization focused on ending homophobia in sports.

"The most impactful moments in history are the ones when social issues and sports intersected," said Taylor. "When Jackie Robinson stepped onto the playing field. The black power salute at the 1968 Olympics. Those are the moments that change a country."

Follow Star reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow.

Final Four: NCAA March Madness heads to a transformed Minneapolis

MINNEAPOLIS — The last time a college men’s basketball champion was crowned in this city, fans walked through a neighborhood that was charmless and nameless in order to sit in a nondescript domed stadium to see the Duke Blue Devils cut down the nets.

The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, a marshmallow surrounded by parking lots, hosted Final Fours in 1992 and 2001. By 2008, it was deemed obsolete for the occasion and Minneapolis lost its bid to land another.

The decade since has brought a remarkable transformation to the rapidly growing city, and especially to the area now known as Downtown East. U.S. Bank Stadium has risen where the Metrodome was laid to rest, occupying the same footprint but hardly the same plane. The $1.1 billion glass-enclosed marvel dominates a new urban landscape and will welcome 70,000 spectators when the Final Four is contested Saturday and Monday.

The stadium, under construction in 2014 when Minneapolis won the right to host the 2018 Super Bowl and this Final Four, has helped spur $600 million in development surrounding it. That includes two office buildings, commercial, retail, housing and even a park.

They’ve razed the parking lots and put up a paradise.

“It’s still transforming,” Chuck Lutz said of the Downtown East neighborhood. “The stadium was the catalyst. Another major catalyst for that area was there was just no place else for downtown Minneapolis to expand. All other sides of downtown are constrained. So the development pressure certainly was heading east.

“What we didn’t want to do is create another downtown. So we wanted more of a neighborhood feel as opposed to another neighborhood of skyscrapers, because we already have that.”

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Still, Lutz vividly recalls how “contentious” the process was. Taxpayers were on the hook for about half of the costs. The stadium project passed the Minneapolis City Council on a 7-6 vote.

“There is some hangover. There are some people that are still opposed to the stadium,” Lutz said. “Some of these feelings will never die.”

Over the past 20 years, the city has built seven major sports venues. Adjusted for inflation, these stadiums together cost $2.5 billion, and Minnesota taxpayers shelled out 56 percent of it: $1.4 billion.

Lutz has worked for Minneapolis since 1986, now as part of its Department of Community Planning and Economic Development.

He remembers well the wasteland that surrounded the Metrodome, a building that housed the Minnesota Vikings and Minnesota Twins from 1982 to 2013 but never inspired any nightlife — or life at all, really — around it. There was one bar nearby, Hubert’s. And it didn’t survive the redevelopment of the past five years.

Minneapolis has added 40,000 residents since 2000, its largest rate of growth since a post-World War II surge saw it reach the apex of its population at 522,000 in 1950. It’s just north of 422,000 now, with the city having a stated goal of getting to 500,000 by 2025. Lutz thinks it will get there.

The growth in Downtown East has helped. There are now about 2,000 apartment and condominium units in the area, Lutz said. The condos, along the river, have attracted a great deal of empty-nesters. The apartments tend to be populated by young adults.

In 2001, basketball fans would have been hard-pressed to navigate the three blocks from the stadium to the Mississippi. It’s much more accessible now, with trails and the two-square-block Gold Medal Park.

The city is embracing the river and its heritage as the “Flour Milling Capital of the World.” The Mill City Museum, opened in 2003 near the Metrodome, is a popular example.

“That’s what we are,” Lutz said simply. “We are here because of the river.”

All of this was important in securing the chance to host the Final Four, said Melvin Tennant, president and CEO of Meet Minneapolis, a key figure in preparing the bid.

“We’re selling a compact urban experience,” Tennant said, pointing out that fans can walk or take light rail lines from their hotels to the games and all the ancillary events associated with a Final Four.

The bid to host the Final Four came with a guarantee of 10,000 hotel rooms within a 30-minute radius of downtown. But even fans farther out won’t need to rent cars to get around.

That is because Minneapolis is now linked by light rail routes that didn’t exist in 2001. The blue line goes to the airport and the Mall of America; the green line connects downtown Minneapolis with downtown St. Paul. Both will bring fans right to the stadium’s large, rotating doors.

It is why the new stadium was built on the same spot as the old, even though the construction forced the Vikings to spend two seasons playing on the University of Minnesota campus. The Twins had departed for their new $522 million Target Field in 2010.

The city is expecting 94,000 visitors for the Final Four; there were an estimated 125,000 for the Super Bowl.

Those visitors, if they take the time, will notice a city becoming more diverse by the day. The Scandinavian influence is still present in long-standing places like the American Swedish Institute. But there is also a Somali Museum of Minnesota that opened in 2011. The largest concentration of the Somali population is a half-mile east of U.S. Bank Stadium.

On the south side of Minneapolis, a growing Latino community has transformed East Lake Street with a global market and other shops.

“Those populations have settled in all parts of the city, bringing new shops, new restaurants, and really breathing life into corridors that were struggling before,” Lutz said. “A lot of people think of Minneapolis in old terms, largely all-white and Scandinavian. While that population still exists, it certainly is not representative of the city any longer because we are multicultural.”

The Twin Cities and their suburbs are home to 18 Fortune 500 companies. UnitedHealth Group is the largest with 2017 revenues of $201 billion. Target is the most ubiquitous, its name and logo on the basketball arena and baseball stadium and nearly anywhere else you look.

Then there is U.S. Bancorp, which sits at No. 122 on the Fortune 500 and paid $220 million to have its name attached to the shiny new stadium for 25 years. The company, and the city, is betting this won’t be the last Final Four under the stadium's translucent roof. The stadium is designed to offer views of downtown Minneapolis. Unlike the last time the Final Four stopped here, there is actually something to see.


New Pepsi logo: Branding updated on cola cans before 125th ...

Pepsi is updating the soft drink's logo ahead of its 125th anniversary – while paying tribute to the pop in the brand's classic labeling.

The new logo, which replaces one used since 2008, has a bold "PEPSI" centered in a black-bordered circle over red, white and blue stripes. The current logo displays the word "pepsi" in a leaner font, alongside a globe with more muted colors.

The goal in reimagining the logo was to infuse "great energy and confidence and boldness," PepsiCo chief design officer Mauro Porcini told USA TODAY.

PepsiCo will begin using the new logo this fall in the U.S. and Canada on "electric" blue and black cans and in promotions. PepsiCo will roll out the logo internationally in 2024.

Revamping Pepsi logo: Several years before it was in the can

The company began rethinking its branding over the past few years. Focus groups liked the past logos with the word "Pepsi" inside a globe, Pepsi chief marketing officer Todd Kaplan said.

Consumer research revealed a preference for those Pepsi logos from the '70s and '80s. "So there was this implicit connection that we thought was not even out there today," Kaplan said. "The challenge was: How can we take something that was part of our heritage and our past and project it to the present and the future?"

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The richer "electric" blue and black (now the color of Pepsi Zero Sugar cans) will be used across the portfolio to bring "a contemporary edge" to the brand's color scheme, the company says in a press release.

The new logo lends itself to artistic renditions not only on delivery trucks, hats and merchandise but also in vibrant animations in video and online. "It looks like a badge that you can wear or put on equipment (but) is very aligned to the latest trends in terms of visual communications," Porcini said.

An unveiling video shows what look like waves of energy, sound and lights radiating from the new logo and cans. Similar artwork is shown on sample social media posts, 12-packs and delivery trucks.

The 'Pepsi pulse' recalls brand's connection to music

A "Pepsi pulse" emanating from the logo or can is a reminder of Pepsi's connection to music, Porcini said. "Music is in the DNA of the brand," he said.

The new logo is better suited for a digital world and "can bring new energy ... (and) endless potential and opportunities in licensing in the worlds of music and in sport," Porcini said. "It is something we can leverage to convey that idea of unapologetic enjoyment once again."

More adaptable messaging is important in a competitive marketplace. PepsiCo has a 22.9% share of the total volume of soda sales in the U.S. compared with Coke, which has 43.4%, according to Euromonitor International. Coke has increased its market share from 42.7% in 2021, while Pepsi has declined from 24.2%, the market research firm said.

Dig Deeper:

Follow Mike Snider on Twitter: @mikesnider.

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Why Wendy's in Canada has given its iconic red-headed mascot ...

New York CNN —

The Wendy’s mascot has a new hairdo on its Canadian social media sites – all in support of one of the nation’s veteran journalists.

The fast food giant’s Canada unit posted a new profile picture on its Twitter feed Thursday that gave Wendy’s iconic red pigtails a gentle gray shade. The company posted the picture, with the hashtags #LisaLaFlamme and #NewProfilePic and the caption “Because a star is a star regardless of hair colour,” using two star emojis. It had more than 45,000 likes on Saturday.

LaFlamme worked at Bell Media as a reporter and news anchor on CTV National News for more than 30 years, the last 11 as its anchor. This month, she revealed that she was told on June 29 that her contract was ending, bringing her career at the network to a sudden end.

In an August 15 video posted to Twitter, LaFlamme said she was “blindsided” by the decision to let her go, and that it was “crushing to be leaving CTV in a manner that’s not my choice.”

The news that her contract was not renewed has received significant blowback in Canada, with claims that her decision to stop coloring her hair blonde during the pandemic was a major factor in the company’s decision. “At 58, I still thought I’d have a lot more time to tell more of the stories that impact our daily lives,” LaFlamme said in the video.

In a statement, Bell Media’s President and Chief Executive Officer Mirko Bibic said LaFlamme’s hair color had nothing to do with the company’s decision to let her go. “That is not the case,” he said, adding that the company is implementing an independent review.

CNN has reached out to Bell Media for comment.

A Bell Media executive, Michael Melling, is taking a leave from the company after The Globe and Mail reported that he asked who approved the decision to “let Lisa’s hair go grey.” Melling, vice president of Bell Media, CTV’s parent company, started heading the news division in January. He was the one who informed LaFlamme that she would no longer hold her role on the newscast.

Wendy’s is not the only brand in Canada to show its support for LaFlamme. Though the former news anchor was not specifically mentioned in it, Dove Canada launched a campaign last week asking its followers to turn their profile pictures to greyscale, and donated $100,000 to an organization advocating for inclusive workplaces for women.

The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Twitter account retweeted its cover of this year’s swimsuit edition featuring Maye Musk, Elon Musk’s mother who also has gray hair, with the comment that “We’re going grey with @Dove in support of women aging confidently on their own terms.”

Age is beautiful. Women should be able to do it on their own terms, without any consequences 👩🏼🦳👩🏾🦳Dove is donating $100,000 to Catalyst, a Canadian organization helping build inclusive workplaces for all women. Go grey with us, turn your profile picture greyscale and #KeepTheGrey pic.twitter.com/SW5X93r4Qj — Dove Canada (@DoveCanada) August 21, 2022

Dove’s Canada Twitter acount responded to the Wendy’s tweet with one of its own: “Looks Beautiful, Wendy!” it says, with the hashtag #KeepTheGrey. It had almost 6,000 likes on Saturday.

Starbucks is planning to phase out its iconic cups | CNN Business

New York CNN Business —

Starbucks has a love-hate relationship with its cups.

The company’s white — or sometimes holiday-themed — logo-emblazoned paper cups for hot drinks, and clear plastic cups for cold drinks are instantly recognizable symbols of the brand. But that’s not entirely a good thing.

“Our cup is ubiquitous, and we love that,” said Michael Kobori, Starbucks chief sustainability officer. “But it is also this ubiquitous symbol of a throwaway society.”

That’s because the cups are disposable. When they are thrown away, the cups end up in landfills or as litter in streets and waterways. Some might be recycled, but recycling is an imperfect option — recyclable items still end up in landfills.

The best solution? “Eliminating the disposable cup,” Kobori said. He called that option “the holy grail.”

The traditional Starbucks disposable cup. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

By 2025, the company wants every customer to be able to either use their own mug easily or borrow a ceramic or reusable to-go mug from their local Starbucks. That could mean rolling out more borrow-a-mug programs that require a deposit.

Starbucks is also planning, by the end of next year, to let customers use their own personal mugs at every Starbucks in the United States and Canada, even if they order ahead or use the drive-thru.

The goals don’t mean Starbucks will get rid of the paper and plastic cups. But they do want to make that option less attractive. That won’t be easy to do, as most Starbucks customers are used to that simple, single-use option. But the company has a plan.

Testing out Borrow-A-Cup programs

Examples of Starbucks' reusable cups. Courtesy Starbucks Coffee Company

To phase out disposables, Starbucks is considering a widespread borrow-a-cup program, in which customers pay a deposit for a durable cup that they take with them and drop back off after use.

Amelia Landers, a vice president of product experience whose team is responsible for sustainable packaging at Starbucks, expects that this model will resonate more with customers compared to other sustainability efforts.

“I think that will take the lead,” she said. “We are testing a number of different [borrow-a-cup] programs around the globe,” including “20 different iterations and in eight different markets.”

In Seattle, Starbucks tested a beta version of such a program last year.

“We developed a new cup that had a very low environmental footprint, was lightweight polypropylene, ultimately recyclable and could replace 100 single-use disposable cups,” Landers explained.

For that test, customers paid a $1 deposit, and had to return the cup to a smart bin located in the store to get their dollar back. Customers also earned rewards for using the cup.

Kim Davis, who manages a store where the program was tested, said that customers were curious about the bin, and once baristas explained it to them, many were on board with the concept.

“The excitement and engagement was really high among my customers and my [employees],” she said. For baristas, the process was straightforward enough — they just used the reusable cup instead of a regular one to prepare drinks. A third-party company collected the dirty cups for cleaning, so baristas didn’t have to worry about that part of the process.

Starbucks (SBUX) is running similar pilot programs in Japan, Singapore and the United Kingdom.

The model is the most promising because it’s the easiest to integrate into customers’ daily lives.

You don’t have to remember to bring your own reusable mug or, if you do, get stuck with a dirty cup for the rest of the day. And you don’t need to sit and sip your coffee at a Starbucks, something most people don’t have time for on a weekday morning.

But that model is still just being tested, so the company wants to encourage the use of reusable mugs in other ways.

Bringing back the personal cup

Starbucks wants all customers to be able to use reusable mugs and glasses at its stores. Courtesy Starbucks Coffee Company

Early in the pandemic, when people feared that the coronavirus could spread easily on surfaces, Starbucks barred customers from bringing their own mugs. It has since brought back the option and is now trying out ways to make it more attractive.

“We’re testing an incentive on the personal cup to go up from where it is today — from 10 cents to 50 cents,” Landers said. “We are also going to be testing a disposable cup fee.” She added that the chain is also experimenting with discounted prices for people who use a Starbucks-provided ceramic mug in stores.

That’s simple enough. But it gets a lot more complicated when customers bring their own cups to the drive-thru or when they order ahead through the Starbucks app.

Years ago, ordering ahead or using a drive-thru might have been a rare enough occasion. But since the pandemic, more customers have been coming through the drive-thru or ordering ahead.

During a February analyst call, Starbucks CFO Rachel Ruggeri said that Starbucks’ drive-thru windows and its mobile orders together account for about 70% of sales at US stores operated by the company.

So to achieve its zero-disposable-cups goal, Starbucks needs to figure out how to get reusables through a drive-thru, and make them available to customers who order ahead.

To that end, Starbucks has been testing different options at its innovation center.

“We’ve got mock stores set up,” said Landers. “We have different versions of the drive-thru layout.”

Customers can simply give their cups to baristas at the drive-thru window. But Starbucks is exploring ways to make the process smoother.

One option is to allow customers to drop off their cups at an earlier point in the drive-thru lane so that the drink is ready in a personal cup once they swing around to the window, Landers said. Another is for baristas to pre-make drinks when customers place their orders, and pour them into personal tumblers at the window or when they arrive at a store to pick up their order. Starbucks is also testing out cup-washing stations in stores.

The team is trying “different things, over and over again,” to figure out what might work, she said. “We’re right now in the middle of all of that work.”

It’s crucial for Starbucks’ mobile order and drive-thru experiences to be seamless. After just a few sluggish pickups, customers may take their business elsewhere.

But Starbucks also has to be careful not to put too much additional burden on employees, who already have to prepare complicated, customized orders at high speeds.

That’s especially important now. Workers across the country are considering unionization, going against the wishes of the company’s leadership.

A Starbucks, in Buffalo, New York, was the first to vote to unionize in December. Employees at a handful of other stores have since made similar efforts and several Starbucks around the country are preparing for their own votes.

If the company’s initiative leads to the end of paper and plastic cups at Starbucks, it will be quite an achievement.

“We know that even the most ardent of sustainability champion customers, they really don’t change their behavior all that easily,” Landers said. “Even though they really, really want to.”

General Mills to ax artificial flavors from cereals

Hadley Malcolm

USA TODAY

Trix, Lucky Charms and other iconic cereals are getting a natural upgrade in the latest bid by a major food company to create healthier products.

General Mills (GIS) said Monday that it will phase out artificial flavors and colors from all of its cereals by 2017. The announcement is the latest from an ever-growing group of food retailers vowing to ax artificial ingredients, including Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Panera, Kraft Foods Group and Subway.

"We've continued to listen to consumers who want to see more recognizable and familiar ingredients on the labels and challenged ourselves to remove barriers that prevent adults and children from enjoying our cereals," said Jim Murphy, president of General Mills cereal division, in a statement.

Packaged-food companies are losing market share and seeing revenue fall as consumers turn toward brands known for less processed, simpler, more authentic food. Many companies are trying to draw back customers' attention by redoing products with fewer complex ingredients and taking stands against additives like antibiotics in meat.

Those that don't will likely lose customers, says Kelly O'Keefe, a brand management professor at Virginia Commonwealth University.

"They need to be investing, they need to be changing out their product lines with better ingredients and they need to do it very quickly," he says. "In the next two to three years, if you're not moving in the right direction you're going to see those brands fading rapidly into obscurity."

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General Mills cereals such as Trix and Reese's Puffs will now be made with fruit and vegetable juices and natural vanilla. Trix will lose some colors in the process. The company began reformulating it about three years ago, and when the new version rolls out this winter, it will have just four colors instead of six. Blue and green didn't make the cut because the company hasn't identified a suitable natural alternative.

"We're continuing to work on them, but they didn't deliver on that vibrant color that we expect from Trix," says Kate Gallager, a General Mills cereal developer. Reese's Puffs, also rolling out this winter, will no longer be artificially colored, but Gallager says the difference is barely noticeable. The recipe changes will only affect cereals sold in the U.S. and Canada.

General Mills, whose cereals include Corn Chex, Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs, Wheaties and Fiber One, declined to say how much it's investing to upgrade ingredients, but the cost won't be passed along to consumers, says spokesman Mike Siemienas.

Though consumers will likely eventually have to pay for all the ingredient changes food companies are making, O'Keefe says.

"(Companies) might be willing to take a slightly shallower profit for a couple years, but ultimately, if they're not passing along the cost to the consumers, they're not staying in business."

Artificial ingredients are already absent from 60% of General Mills cereals, the company said. They either never had them or they were already replaced.

Reformulating cereals with marshmallows will be a focus next year, says the company, adding this may take longer than grain-heavy cereals. General Mills plans to have more than 90% of the cereal portfolio artificial-free by the end of 2016, with 100% free by the end of 2017.

The hardest part about switching from artificial ingredients to natural ingredients is maintaining consistent flavor and texture, according to Gallager. Natural dyes like turmeric for yellow, paprika for red and fruit and vegetable concentrates can sometimes impart too much flavor or don't produce colors that are as bold.

Beyond cereal, General Mills says it's already transforming multiple product lines to make them healthier.

Last week the company was in the spotlight thanks to the Food and Drug Administration's announcement that food manufacturers must get rid of trans fats by 2018. General Mills' brands include Betty Crocker and Pillsbury, whose baking mixes and frosting tubs include partially hydrogenated oil, the primary contributor to trans-fat consumption.

General Mills said last week that it's already working to remove trans fats from products and that more than 95% of its products are already trans-fat free.

Sprite will no longer be sold in green bottles | CNN Business

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Still here? BlackBerry Key2 aims to keep faded iconic brand breathing

“An icon reborn.”

That’s the hopeful marketing phrase TCL Communication is using to pump up interest in the latest BlackBerry smartphone, the Key2, which begins to ship globally this month. In the U.S., it will cost $649. As with the BlackBerrys of yesteryear, this latest device emphasizes a physical Qwerty keyboard, industrial-strength security and long battery life.

You’re forgiven if your first response is one of surprise: “BlackBerrys are still around?”

It’s been about 16 months since China's TCL, under the BlackBerry Mobile brand, unveiled a predecessor model, the BlackBerry KeyOne, at the Mobile World Congress industry trade show in Barcelona.

By then BlackBerry — the Waterloo, Canada company — had stopped making BlackBerry hardware, instead licensing the brand to TCL. But that BlackBerry, known in its heyday as Research In Motion or RIM, still contributes much of the DNA inside a BlackBerry phone.

In one form or another, BlackBerry has been on the comeback trail for several years now, and while the market for BlackBerry isn’t exactly thriving, the fact that there even will be a Key2 after the KeyOne has to say something.

Alain Lejeune, who is a senior vice president at TCL Communication and the president of BlackBerry Mobile, told me he’s realistic about BlackBerry’s current standing. While he wouldn’t disclose sales figures, he claims the KeyOne is making a “positive contribution to TCL.”

Lejeune recognizes that for the Key2 to succeed, BlackBerry must go beyond nostalgia and appeal to smartphone users who have grown up in the iPhone era, a tough task.

He hopes that in the race to uniformity among smartphones, BlackBerrys will stand out for being, well, different.

Why for example, wouldn’t at least some young people find a physical keyboard appealing the way their parents once did?

Of course, TCL’s ongoing challenge has been to make today's BlackBerry both modern and relevant. Along those lines, the Key2 becomes the first BlackBerry with dual rear cameras, each 12MP. Better late than never. Same goes for the new Portrait mode feature.

But when it comes to the camera, there’s no facial recognition as on the iPhone X or some Samsung Galaxys.

Inside the Key2 is a robust Qualcomm processor, 6GB of memory, and 64 or 128GB storage options, expandable through MicroSD.

As an Android Oreo phone, the Key2 has Google Lens and the Google Assistant.

The physical hardware has an aluminum frame and soft back. The screen is a modest-sized 4.5-inch touch display.

BlackBerry still must play up to its traditional strengths, and that means security. An improved version of the DTEK by BlackBerry security app that we’ve seen on other BlackBerry models comes preloaded here. It gives you an overall reading on how secure your phone is, and you can dig deeper for info on downloaded apps, managing permissions as necessary. DTEK might tell you, for example, how many times a given app might have retrieved your location and reports on what apps are doing in the foreground and the background.

A password or fingerprint-protected Locker app is a handy place to stash photos, documents and even entire apps from prying eyes, a dating program for example.

With the renewed focus these days on privacy, maybe that's what it will take to give this faded brand the latest boost to keep going.

Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow USA TODAY Personal Tech Columnist @edbaig on Twitter

Is this the last Christmas for Sears? | CNN Business

New York CNN Business —

Tracy Easterling spent about an hour Sunday shopping at Sears, which used to be one of her favorite stores. She ended up with nothing to show for it but memories.

Easterling was at the Sears in her hometown of Jersey City, New Jersey, one of only 15 full-line Sears stores still open. Sears was once the world’s largest and most important retailer.

“It’s the first time I’ve been here in awhile,” she said as she browsed the shoe selection, where the shoes were still boxed up rather than out on display.

“I just came in looking for sales. But it’s so empty, and there’s not a lot to choose from,” she said. “Back in the day you could come in and get most everything you needed in one store.”

Easterling said when she told friends that she was going to be stopping at Sears, their reactions were: “Is there still a Sears that’s open?”

“Look at it. It’s as empty as can be,” she said looking down aisles without seeing any other customers, despite shoppers being out in force on the weekend after Thanksgiving.

Most of the smattering of shoppers in the Jersey City store Sunday were older, and like Easterling, could remember Sears in its heyday.

Many quickly left without finding what they were looking for. A few of the younger shoppers said they stopped by only because they could remember coming in as a kid.

“I used to shop here years ago with my great-grandmother,” said Razeyah Surrell, 23, who came hunting for a pair of pants while shopping with his friend Taryn Reczkowski, 22. They left quickly after Surrell couldn’t find what he was looking for.

“I walked in and said, ‘Wow, this is sad,’” Reczkowski said.

Sears was once a powerhouse

It has been a slow, quiet death for an iconic chain, whose groundbreaking catalog and anchor position at many malls nationwide once made Sears both the Amazon (AMZN) and the Walmart of its day.

When Sears and Kmart merged in 2005, they counted 3,500 US stores between them and more than 300,000 employees. But both brands were already in a downward spiral. After the merger the company concentrated on selling off its more attractive real estate and buying back stock in an effort to prop up its declining share price, rather than investing in modernizing stores to make them competitive.

By 2018 the company had filed for bankruptcy. Eddie Lampert, the hedge fund operator who had engineered the disastrous Kmart merger and served as the holding company’s CEO, bought the remains of the business out of bankruptcy in early 2019. He had promised to turn things around after it had shed much of its debt, unprofitable stores and less attractive leases.

The company that emerged from bankruptcy in early 2019 — with the overly optimistic name Transformco — owned 223 Sears and 202 Kmart stores nationwide. But less than four years later, it is barely on life support, as the miniscule brick-and-mortar footprint and lack of shoppers demonstrates.

Now experts say there’s basically little to no reason to keep even the handful of stores it still has open.

“Sears has been going down the drain for a very long time. There’s no chance of it being revitalized,” said Neil Saunders, managing director at GlobalData Retail. “No one apart from Eddie Lampert knows why he’s keeping these remaining stores open. You can’t make the economics work with that volume of stores.”

As for why Sears has hasn’t yet pulled the plug, Saunders said, “It might be that in some contracts or agreements that there is a penalty if he closes all the stores. Or perhaps they’re open because Eddie Lampert has a very strange view of business. He still seems to hold onto this illusion that he can bring it back. A lot of it could be about ego.”

What might have been

Although the company’s demise seems inevitable now, it didn’t need to be this way, insists Mark Cohen, director of retail studies at Columbia University and the former CEO of Sears’ Canadian unit before the Kmart merger.

He said that Sears’ experience operating its catalog, which had an all-encompassing list of products, positioned it better than other traditional retailers to make an early move into online sales. And he said Sears had better lease agreements than competing department store chains.

“It could have been a rival to Amazon. It had been the Amazon of its day,” Cohen said. “No doubt that Sears would have needed to close stores and consolidate holdings, but their real estate holdings would not have been the albatross they were for other department store chains. Nothing would have stopped it from having a second life as a world beater. At the end of the day, this was all about the incompetence and malfeasance of its leadership.”

A dismantled sign leans outside a Sears store in Nanuet, New York, one day after it closed in 2019. Mike Segar/Reuters Businessman Richard W. Sears was a railroad station agent who started selling watches as a side business in North Redwood, Minnesota, in 1886. The following year, he moved to the company's first Chicago location and hired watchmaker Alvah Roebuck. The two started a catalog business selling watches and jewelry in 1888, incorporating under the Sears Roebuck name in 1893. Chicago History Museum/Getty Images The cover of a Sears Roebuck and Co. catalog in the fall of 1900. The Sears catalog was the way many Americans first started to buy mass-produced goods. Bettmann/Getty Images A Sears, Roebuck and Co. store in El Paso, Texas, circa 1940. Sears' stores helped reshape America, drawing shoppers away from the traditional Main Street merchants. Fotosearch/Getty Images Sales clerks go on strike in Chicago circa 1946. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis/Getty Images A Sears store in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1949. Bettmann/Getty Images People vote inside a Sears store in Tucson, Arizona, in 1953. PhotoQuest/Getty Images A woman receives a cosmetics consultation at a Sears store in Caracas, Venezuela, circa 1953. Jack Manning/Hulton Archive/Getty Images A worker goes over files in Sears' catalog office. Frank Scherschel/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images Cars fill a parking lot outside a Sears store, circa 1958. A. Y. Owen/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images Sales clerk Lucille Jagusch shows drapery samples to shopper Arlene Hardt at a Sears store in Niles, Illinois, in 1961. File photo/AP People shop inside a Sears store in Morton Grove, Illinois, in 1961. AP Soldiers guard a Sears store in Baltimore after riots broke out following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images People watch the Apollo 11 rocket launch at a Sears store in White Plains, New York, in 1969. Ron Frehm/AP An iron worker helps construct the Sears Tower in Chicago. Sears' new headquarters, built in 1973, was the world's tallest building until 1998. Sears sold the building in 1994. Bettmann Archive/Getty Images A customer shops in Woodfield, Illinois, in 1991. Ralf-Finn Hestoft/Corbis/Getty Images A woman works at a Sears in Hicksville, New York, in 1994. Mark Peterson/Corbis/Getty Images Seth Meyers, left, and Hugh Jackman play Sears photographers during a "Saturday Night Live" skit in 2001. NBCUniversal/Getty Images Kaylin Wilson sets up children's clothes in a Kmart in Nashua, New Hampshire, in 2005. The store was the first Kmart in the country to begin receiving Sears merchandise after stockholders voted on a merger to form the nation's third largest retailer. Jim Cole/AP Black Friday shoppers duck under the opening door of a Sears store in Mentor, Ohio, in 2011. Bloomberg/Getty Images A woman in Mississauga, Ontario, looks at used store furniture for sale in 2018. The Sears location was closing forever. Rene Johnston/Toronto Star/Getty Images Shoppers wait in line by an empty rack of jeans during a 2019 Black Friday sale at a Sears store in Hialeah, Florida. Maria Alejandra Cardona/Reuters Residents cast their vote in the 2020 presidential election at a shuttered Sears store in Janesville, Wisconsin. Scott Olson/Getty Images Cesar Villasenor, right, sweeps away dirt in front of a vacant Sears store in Santa Monica, California, in 2020. The location underwent a $50 million makeover to turn the Art Deco-style building into an office, restaurant and retail complex. Mel Melcon/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images A police sergeant receives a Covid-19 vaccination in a former Sears store at the Townsquare Mall in Rockaway, New Jersey, in 2021. Sarah Blesener/The New York Times/Bloomberg/Getty Images People arrive to receive Covid-19 shots in 2021 at a vaccination site in a former Sears store at the Lake Square Mall in Leesburg, Florida. Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/Shutterstock Patti Naleck pushes a cart carrying a mannequin through a Sears store that was about to permanently close in Schaumburg, Illinois, in 2021. Naleck said she plans to use the mannequin for Halloween displays. Stacey Wescott/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service/Getty Images In pictures: The rise and fall of Sears Prev Next

If — or perhaps when — Sears does close its final store, it will join a long list of retailers including RadioShack, Payless Shoes, Gymboree and American Apparel, that emerged from bankruptcy only to subsequently go out of business in short order.

Getting a precise count of remaining open stores at the company is difficult. The total of 15 remaining Sears outlets is down about a third from 23 at this time last year. But those numbers come from what’s listed in the store locator on the company’s Web site. Spokespeople for Sears, Transformco and Lampert’s hedge fund did not respond to questions about the remaining store count, the company’s profitability or its plans going forward.

Will the Sears name survive?

The name Sears might survive even if the final full-line stores close.

After emerging from bankruptcy, Transformco bought the holding company it had previously spun off, which includes a chain of franchisee-owned stores operating under the name Sears Hometown. The stores are a fraction of the size of the full-line Sears and concentrate on selling appliances, tools and outdoor equipment.

There were about 700 of those stores just before Transformco reacquired Sears Hometown in 2019, but they’ve been steadily closing as well. About 100 stores closed earlier this year, leaving just more than 100 open today.

Kmart has shriveled to an even smaller size.

A year ago there were only six Kmart stores on the US mainland, and six more across Puerto Rico, Guam and the US Virgin Islands. Since then the store in Puerto Rico has closed and there are only three stores left in the mainland, one each in Florida, New Jersey and Long Island, New York, according to Dick Barta, a former Kmart employee who has closely tracked store closings over the years. The Kmart website backs up those numbers.

The holiday shopping season is off to a strong start, and that might help keep Sears breathing a little while longer. But if the US economy does topple into recession as many economists fear, it could be the final straw that leads to its demise, said Katie Thomas, head of the Kearney Consumer Institute, an internal think tank at the Kearney consulting firm.

“It’s tough to make the case consumers will go to those stores if they’re pulling back spending,” she said. “I think that [a recession] could be the final nail in the coffin.”

As for when Sears might finally close the last remaining stores, Cohen said it really doesn’t matter at this point.

“The time of death was 2005,” he said, referring to the year Lampert took control of the company.

Wahlburgers partnering with Hy-Vee stores and coming to South ...

Brenda Wade Schmidt

Argus Leader

Hy-Vee Inc. will bring a new restaurant concept to Sioux Falls with Wahlburgers restaurants, the Iowa-based grocery store chain said Thursday.

Without providing specifics of where in Sioux Falls Hy-Vee stores might put the new Wahlburgers and when it might build it, Sioux Falls is identified on the map as being part of the future expansion. All stores with Market Grille restaurants also will see select Wahlburgers menu items locally. Hy-Vee has seven stores in Sioux Falls.

"I don't have a date for Sioux Falls," said Jeremy Gosch, executive vice president of strategy and chief merchandising officer. "Sioux Falls is in the plan." The restaurant location will be where it best makes sense for a restaurant and not necessarily by a grocery store, he said.

Hy-Vee plans to build, own and operate 26 Wahlburgers restaurants in seven midwestern states, nearly doubling the brand's current locations through a strategic partnership to diversify business, the company said in a news release. The company also will partner with Orangetheory Fitness to provide access to group fitness in or adjacent to Hy-Vee stores.

“These unprecedented collaborations reinforce our company’s longstanding commitment to health and wellness, culinary expertise and customer experience,” said Hy-Vee Chairman, CEO and President Randy Edeker. “However, they also represent a bold step to deliberately evolve our business to meet the change in our customers’ lifestyles and spending habits. These partnerships keep us on the leading edge as the retail grocery industry evolves.”

The first Hy-Vee-owned Wahlburgers, a family restaurant that sells signature burgers and drinks, will be in West Des Moines, Iowa, where Hy-Vee has its headquarters. That free-standing restaurant will open in mid-2018, the company said. The first restaurant is not near a Hy-Vee store.

Last year, eating meals outside the home surpassed meals consumed in the home, Hy-Vee said. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, grocery spending trends began to shift in 2014. Millennials have played a significant role in the evolution, spending 44 percent of their food dollars annually on eating out, according to the Food Institute’s analysis of the USDA food expenditure data from 2014. That increase has skyrocketed income spent in restaurants and on take-out meals, rising from 34 percent in 1974 to 50 percent in 2014.

“There is a changing landscape in the retail industry,” Edeker said. “Hy-Vee has a responsibility to our customers, employees and communities to look for new ways to strengthen our company. With this type of progressive action, Hy-Vee is well positioned for future growth.”

Currently, Wahlburgers operates 17 locations in nine states and Canada. With Hy-Vee's partnership, the grocery store will become the brand’s largest single franchisee. In addition, all 84 Hy-Vee Market Grille restaurants will offer Wahlburgers-branded menu items. The Wahlburgers restaurants will complement Hy-Vee’s Market Grille restaurants, and tie into to the organization’s commitment to providing culinary expertise and experiences, Hy-Vee said.

Paul Wahlberg, chef and co-founder of Wahlburgers, said he welcomes Hy-Vee to the company. “It’s a great honor to be able to partner up with a company that has a long and successful history in the two areas that are very important to Wahlburgers, quality and customer service."

Orangetheory Fitness is a revolutionary fitness program with an intensive group training workout. With 750 studios open nationwide, the company is on track to open 1,500 in the next two years. Hy-Vee will partner with Orangetheory to offer customers a fitness experience in or adjacent to Hy-Vee stores.

In addition, Hy-Vee dietitians will work with Orangetheory members to offer dietetic services, provide samples of nutritional products and lead store tours to showcase items that align with member needs. This partnership creates an integrated fitness component to bolster Hy-Vee’s focus on health and wellness – including in-store dietitians, HealthMarkets, chefs, fresh and organic produce and pharmacies.

The first Hy-Vee Orangetheory Fitness location will open in 2017 in the Twin Cities.

“Orangetheory is a revolutionary fitness experience, which combined with Hy-Vee’s health offerings, creates a one-stop shop for wellness,” said Orangetheory Fitness Chief Brand Officer Kevin Keith. “Like our members, we know that many Hy-Vee customers are looking for more convenient ways to access fitness and healthy eating options in one location – this partnership solves that need.”

Hy-Vee, Inc. an employee-owned corporation operating more than 240 retail stores across eight Midwestern states, has sales of $9.8 billion annually.

Wahlburgers, based in Hingham, Mass., was founded by Executive Chef Paul Wahlberg, celebrity brothers Mark and Donnie and other investors. Wahlburgers offers a fun, casual music-filled atmosphere where the Chef Paul inspired menu features a variety of fresh burgers, housemade condiments, crispy haddock, seared chicken and vegetarian options along with thick creamy frappes and floats. Wahlburgers’ full-service bar offers adult frappes, cocktails, wines and beers.

Aunt Jemima to change name, remove image of Black woman

The pancake syrup company Aunt Jemima is changing its name and imaging in the wake of renewed calls for racial equality.

The Quaker Oats-owned company said Wednesday that the iconic Aunt Jemima figure on its packaging is "based on a racial stereotype" and acknowledged that its prior work to update the character was "not enough."

"We will continue the conversation by gathering diverse perspectives from both our organization and the Black community to further evolve the brand," said Kristin Kroepfl, vice president and chief marketing officer of Quaker Foods North America, in a statement sent to USA TODAY. The move was reported earlier by NBC News and Adweek.

Shoppers will start to see new packaging at the grocery store without the Aunt Jemima image in the fourth quarter of this year. The company's new name for the syrup and other products will be announced soon after.

Protests:Yelp adds tool search for black-owned businesses

Following the news of Aunt Jemima's future evolution, two other iconic brands, Uncle Ben's and Mrs. Butterworth's, announced that they were also looking at making changes.

Mars-owned Uncle Ben's said it plans to change the image on its rice packaging, but said in a release that it didn't yet know "what the exact changes or timing will be, but we are evaluating all possibilities."

Conagra Brands, owner of Mrs. Butterworth's, says it has "begun a complete brand and packaging review" of the syrup brand.

“The Mrs. Butterworth's brand, including its syrup packaging, is intended to evoke the images of a loving grandmother,” Conagra Brands said in a statement Wednesday. “We stand in solidarity with our Black and Brown communities and we can see that our packaging may be interpreted in a way that is wholly inconsistent with our values.”

The Aunt Jemima brand was formed in 1889 after owners Chris Rutt and Charles Underwood developed the pancake mix. The character on the box was brought together and inspired by a Black storyteller and cook named Nancy Green, according to the company's website.

More than a century later, Aunt Jemima, who is said to have been born into slavery, no longer resembles a servant from the era. Quaker Oats bought the brand in 1926, and in 1989 swapped her red bandanna for pearl earnings and soft curls.

Do Black employees matter?:Protests lead to reckoning as employees speak out on racism and discrimination at work

Still, the company's image with its Black servant origins has come under fire for perpetuating racist stereotypes.

The marketing shift comes at a time when big brands face increasing pressure to increase diversity efforts and combat racism in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

The news comes one day after parent company PepsiCo announced a $400-million set of initiatives to lift up Black communities over the next five years. Part of the plan is to increase Black representation internally and to introduce mandatory training on unconscious bias.

Contributing: Kelly Tyko

Follow Dalvin Brown on Twitter: @Dalvin_Brown.

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