Super Bowl XLVIII

Last June, our team re-org'ed at FedEx and we now have responsibility for both the NFL and Racing sports properties. One manager and 5 people to do the same work that 2 managers and 8 people were previously doing...fun times for us. My Racing responsibilities did not change...I still have PR, social and advertising programs, user group promotions and splitting the race hosting with my peers. But I now also have Super Bowl PR and leveraging plus NFL Draft, which means my already full plate is now overflowing. Yay!

But, I did get to experience my first Super Bowl, which was completely awesome and exhausting! And Russ got to go, too, which was an added bonus. The trip wasn't without it's ups and downs, though. I had to fly in on the Tuesday before (the 28th), which meant that I had to miss Caroline's 1st birthday on the 29th. It completely sucked in every way, but luckily I was really busy so my mind was kept occupied. And having her birthday party and celebrating the weekend before helped a ton. 

Hello NYC!

Chocolate football in my room.

Wednesday was a big day for me because I orchestrated the FedEx delivery of the Vince Lombardi trophy. FedEx delivers the trophy every year and we do our best to capture the moment and share it socially and garner PR attention. The delivery started at the flagship Tiffany store (where the trophy is made every year) and made it's way to Super Bowl Boulevard on Times Square where it was signed for by NY Giants star Justin Tuck and put on display for fans for the week. Another project I coordinated was the creation and distribution of 15K reusable shopping bags promoting our One Rate pricing on BLVD. Wednesday was the first of 3 days that our bags were distributed and it was like a mob scene for them. Everyone loves free stuff! It was a COLD day in NYC, but everything went very well overall.

Yep, the trophy's in that box!

Waiting on BLVD in front of the trophy display for the FedEx van to arrive.

Justin Tuck signing for the trophy and installing it on BLVD!

We hired talent to dress as couriers and give out our bags. This particular guy was great!

Beth and I on BLVD giving out bags!

Thursday was another busy and EARLY day (I had to be up at 445a EST!!) as we prepared for Radio Row activities. Most premium sporting events have a "radio row"...it is basically a location where all the radio stations across the country gathers in one place for media interviews leading up to the event. For the Super Bowl, every major media outlet has a presence including top national TV and radio programs like Mike & Mike, Dan Patrick, ESPN, FOX Sports, Sirus and NFL Network. Some of those programs were offsite, but most were setup in the giant conference space...it was CRAZY to see all that activity in one place! And it would be a super-fan's paradise, as EVERY major current and former player in the League was there at some point. We contracted with our FedEx Ground Player of the Year nominees, Jamaal Charles, Matt Forte and LeSean McCoy to conduct interviews that day on FedEx's behalf. I followed Forte most of the day and our schedule had us right behind Dan Marino, Joe Namath and even Jerry Seinfeld.

Jerry Seinfeld!

Their satellite studio was in M&M's World and they got Matt to model this gaudy jacket.

Matt on the Dan Patrick satellite set.
They built a BUILDING for the week on top of a parking garage at Pier 43! It was amazing!!

Ochocinco!

It was super hard to get good photos of Radio Row due to all the lighting, but this is how crazy it was!

That night, we hosted a Facebook Chat with our Ground nominees where fans could tune in and watch the players answer their questions live. Afterwards, we attended the NFLPA Party (NFL Players Association...they help us contract players) as a team. It was a WAY over-the-top event in a gorgeous building fit for a grand wedding. We had lots of player introductions, including Barry Sanders...everyone wants to work with FedEx! We finished the evening with a lovely team dinner at a hole-in-the-wall Italian restaurant that was sooo yummy!

LeSean, Me, Jamaal, Matt and Beth

The FedEx team with Barry Sanders at the NFLPA Party

Awful BB pic, but the venue for the NFLPA Party was beautiful!

My primary responsibilities were pretty much wrapped after Wednesday and Thursday's busyness, minus continuing to push content to our Super Bowl channels throughout the week and the remaining days of FedEx bags on BLVD. Friday and Saturday were still busy with preparations for our Super Bowl brunch and day-of activities, but I love being support staff! I did go to an NFL sponsor reception where we got VIP access (with no line) to the toboggan run on Super Bowl Boulevard! It was super fun!

Walking up the ramp to the top...it was 60' tall!

Jourdan, Katherine and I ready to go!

View from the top! It was awesome!

And we're off!!

View from the bottom...yep, I rode that!

Russ got in late Friday night and he ventured over to see George in Brooklyn. I was glad I stayed put since he didn't get back to the hotel until 4a! On Saturday, he went over to check out the new Freedom Tower and surrounding areas while I worked.  We met up for lunch and then had the afternoon off to go exploring. We did a lot of walking on Super Bowl BLVD and 5th Ave, venturing into FAO Schwartz to get some goodies for the kids...a NYC bus for Tyler and a princess Jack-in-the-Box for Caroline. We checked out NFL House (another sponsor perk that has food, drinks, player appearances and some pampering things like massages, manicures and blow-outs) for dinner and drinks before going to see a show. This coveted free time was the first I'd really had all week and was last minute surprise news since we were all supposed to go to NFL Honors instead. I was glad for the break and booked us to see "Newsies" that morning. The show was fabulous and I was so glad we went!

Russ and George at 230a!

The Freedom Tower!

The memorial reflecting pool.

NFL House

View of the FOX Sports satellite studio on BLVD from NFL House

View of the Lombardi Trophy display on BLVD from NFL House

The Lombardi trophy.

Numerals on BLVD

Despite all our fun, Russ said Skyping with the kids earlier in the morning was the best part of his day!

Super Bowl Sunday was a long but super exciting day! I was up early and off to Jazz at Lincoln Center to help prep for our customer brunch. We had a chalk talk hosted by Dan Marino (Russ' fav player of all time, so he was super pumped!) with Drew Brees and LeSean McCoy. My teammates who led this event did a fabulous job and customers LOVED  the venue and the players. Russ even got a personalized, autographed football from Marino. It was a very nice start to the day!

Beautiful Jazz at Lincoln Center!

Yummy cookies!

Russ enjoying brunch.

Dan Marino kicking off the chalk talk

Dan, LeSean and Drew Brees.

We had a fun photo green screen for the customers that Beth and I tried out...Ha!

The weather actually turned out quite nice on Sunday for what was expected to be the coldest Super Bowl in history. I borrowed and bought lots of cold weather gear for the week and we were prepared to wear ski clothes to the game but luckily didn't have to. Since there was no transportation allowed to the game except by mass transit (so that they could control the crowd and security threats), we loaded a bus with our customers to take us to the game. Once we got to the NFL police escort line, we all actually had to get off for bomb-sniffing dogs to check our bus before we could go! It was pretty painless and I personally was glad for the extra level of security. We got to the stadium (which was actually in NJ and not NY) in record time. 

There it is...from the bus.

Then we waited in a mass crowd of people to get into the NFL Tailgate. Traditional tailgating was not allowed at this Super Bowl (again, for security purposes) and the ticket to the NFL Tailgate was a HOT one! It took almost an hour to get through security, but it was worth it! Again, the NFL does everything BIG and Tailgate was no except. It was held inside the Meadowlands Racetrack on property at MetLife and every level had all kinds of food stations and bars set up. There was live entertainment by Phillip Phillips and the Broadway casts' of Jersey Boys and Rock of Ages. There were 2 team lounges set up for both the Broncos and the Seahawks and even a place for you to send postcards to family and friends at home from the Super Bowl. We had a great time!!

NYC cake

NJ cake

Russ with Seahawks fans...

...and Broncos fans.

Jersey Boys performing

Some of our great staff.

Being crazy fans!! Ha!

Broncos bar with shot luge

Seahawks shot luge bar

They were giving away towels in each of the team's fan zone. Russ got a bunch
for friends and put them all in his jacket pocket making him look a little strange...Ha!

We headed to our seats from Tailgate about 45 minutes before kickoff, exploring all the activities around the stadium as we walked. Our seats were with Beth (my teammate) and her husband Albert and they were on the club level that had access to a heated indoor space. The pregame fesitivities was awesome and the halftime show with Bruno Mars and Red Hot Chili Peppers was fabulous, though the main stage was a little hard to see from our seats. The game itself was a little lackluster, since the Seahawks pretty much ran away with it from the beginning. It would have been nice for a more competitive game. Russ wanted the Broncos to win, but neither of us really cared who won...we were just excited to be at and experience the game. We left in the middle of the 4th quarter to avoid the mass exodus and got back to the city via our bus much easier than expected.

"Kicking" the football...Ha!

Getting attacked by the giant football...

Being very silly...

101st Airborne flyover was awesome!!



The human Dorito! These fans won a contest and trip to the game.

There was a lot of this going on.

Getting ready for the halftime show...they gave us all LED light hats that were
remote synced to the music for the lights show at halftime...it was so cool!

We had a great time with the Popes!

Monday was our planned departure day and we woke up to SNOW!! It was pretty at first, but all I could think about was getting home. My coworkers were all flying out of LaGuardia and they were notified their flights were cancelled at lunch. We were flying out of Newark and went on to the airport hoping we would get out. We didn't...first flight delayed, then flight cancelled. It was such a cluster and we will never fly United again because their service was so awful. It took us about 45 minutes to get rebooked and then we headed to retrieve our bags. They were MIA for almost 2 hours and we ended up finding them in another terminal altogether. Ugh! We were forced to cab-share our way back to the city which took a whole lot longer than it should have, but we did manage to get our same room back at the Westin. We enjoyed a lovely (but expensive!) dinner with my coworkers at Beauty & Essex before we hit the hay. What an exhausting day!!

View from our hotel room window of the snow!

Heading to the airport in the snow.

Lost and the found bags....Hallelujah!

You enter B&E and it looks like a Pawn Shop...the restaurant is behind the door.

It was a really cool place.

Tuesday, I was able to get on a FedEx corporate jet home while Russ waited for his commercial flight. I decided to split from Russ since I had been gone over a week at this point and my mom was home with the kids and needed to get back to Clarksville. I left the hotel at 830a EST and we landed in Memphis around 4p CST. Between the drive to the FBO, to the deicing of the plane, to having to drop another stranded executive off in Pittsburgh, it literally took all day to get home. I was never so glad to be home!!

My view of the city from the cab ride to NJ on the way to the FBO.

But my situation was WAY better than poor Russ. He did not get out on Tuesday and this was what his day looked like as he documented on Facebook..."car to Newark, flight delayed, flight cancelled, new flight rebooked, flight delayed, flight cancelled, flight un-cancelled with terminal change, flight re-cancelled, shuttle to Newark hotel." As soon as we landed, I became Russ' personal travel agent, finally booking him a hotel at the airport and arranging for his travel on Wednesday home where I booked him a train outta Newark (aka Hell, as Russ said) to Baltimore, then flights to Atlanta and Memphis via Delta...we dropped United like a hot potato! 

Russ woke up to this from our hotel window.

He walked to Central Park to get some pics of the snow...the city got 8" overnight!

Cab ride to the airport, day #2!

No wonder he didn't get out on Tuesday.

Granna stayed another night thankfully and helped get the kids off to school before she left while I took the day off trying to get Russ home. His train Wednesday was delayed almost an hour and half so I had to rebook all his flights...again! At one point, Delta wanted to route him to Detroit (no way, he must go south!) and the other rescheduled flight was going to cost $726, so we then ditched Delta and got Russ home on US Airways through Charlotte. I was never so happy to get the "just landed" text from Russ at around 7p that night. He was home in time to see the kids and sleep in his own bed! We both were exhausted!

Snowy view at train station

His plane made it!!

All of his delayed and cancelled flights from him trying to get home.

I asked him if the trip was worth it that night and at first he said, No. But then I brought home his Marino-signed ball and all was right in the world. If nothing else, our travel woes home made a great story! See you NYC... here's hoping my trip back for Draft will be less eventful...