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Performance of West Indies Key for Support – Bryan

February 5, 2007

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Executive Director of the Jamaica Local Organising Committee (LOC) for Cricket World Cup (CWC) 2007, Robert Bryan has said that the performance of the West Indies cricket team is the key to the support level of Jamaica’s Yellow Package.
“I do think that we have a reasonably good package. However, if the West Indies perform at their best, it is going to surprise many about the level of support that can come here as a result,” he said.
He said that currently, there was still “a lot of tickets to sell”, especially for the warm up matches. This he attributed to a confluence of factors, including the structure of the event, where momentum grows from round to round, which would account for more interest shown in the Super Eight, Semi-final and Final stages.
“The structure of this event means that you do not get the normal multiply from round to round, because once the first round is finished the matches will shift to another country and you are out of it except for television. That will have an impact and limit some of the benefits that one will normally see with an event of this nature,” Mr. Bryan noted.
There has also been the unexpected hesitancy of many persons to conduct purchases of online.
“We are aware that a lot of Jamaicans are very uncomfortable in purchasing tickets on the Internet because it is not a traditional means of doing business and people are very wary going onto the platform and sending the money and getting a little receipt and that is not even the ticket,” he said.
However, he expects this situation to change with the start of the last phase of the ticketing programme on February 1, where persons now have the option of buying tickets at the official ticket office located at Shops 51 and 52 in the Kingston Mall in Downtown Kingston, in addition to making purchases online at www.cricketworldcup.com.
The Executive Director also anticipates a lift from Pakistanis based in North America. “For the Pakistan group matches there is more interest because those are competition matches and the outcome of these matches carries all the passion,” he pointed out.
In terms of warm up matches, he said that there was some interest in the West Indies versus India warm up game. This was in evidence when a contingent from the Jamaica LOC and other entities took part in a promotional tour, which included North America, last year.
“The Indian community in North America will come to Jamaica for that Indian warm up match in some numbers, but not spectacular numbers,” he said.
However, he acknowledged that the Kenya and Holland warm up match, under any circumstances, would be a major challenge to sell to fans.
“We are trying to develop the strategies of how we are going to get people interested in coming to that as a warm up match,” he noted.
Meanwhile, Mr. Bryan appealed to the public to understand that unique opportunity to showcase all that is good and special about Jamaica on the world stage.
“I am urging everybody to understand that on this world stage it is important that we pull together and put the Jamaican story out there. That Jamaican story cannot be a negative one because, there are far more positives about this country than there are negative. Of course, we have problems but we have to place that within the context of why the rest of the world admires Jamaica,” he argued.
“At the end of the day the biggest story that will come from hosting this event is Jamaica and we need to appreciate how strong Brand Jamaica is in the world,” Mr. Bryan stressed.
Expounding further on how strong Brand Jamaica is, Mr. Bryan said that when travelling to India last year, the reactions of many persons indicated that “when they think of this region, they identify it with Jamaica, Bob Marley and One Love, which is brand association”.
“We went there with Ambassador Courtney Walsh and he was mobbed and it is all about the Jamaican brand, which we tend to take for granted,” he said.

Last Updated: February 5, 2007

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