Corporate Consulting Division Targets Growth Businesses

Sports Business Journal—August 18, 2014

Excel Sports Management's fledgling corporate consulting business is not in a position to be a major player in the industry and go after its biggest clients, and Joe Zajac, the veteran hired to run the division, knows that.

Excel Consulting "is a startup concern that began, essentially, in November," said Zajac, who has 20 years of experience in sports corporate consulting and now is senior vice president, Excel Consulting. "The McDonald's, the Gatorades, the Nikes and the MasterCards — who spend $100 million on a global sports portfolio — are not in our sweet spot."

What is in Excel's wheelhouse are growth companies. Since November, Excel Consulting has signed Luvo, a healthy foods company; MusclePharm, a sports supplement company that has a deal with Excel client Tiger Woods; and Hospital for Special Surgery as corporate clients.

Zajac is especially proud of signing HSS as a client, as Excel competed against other established corporate consultancies to land the hospital, which has been ranked by U.S. News & World Report as the No. 1 orthopedic hospital in the United States. Excel Consulting is working with HSS to build strategies that encourage elite athletes to consider the hospital, driving awareness of HSS nationally and internationally and especially to the weekend-warrior demographic.

Read the full article on sportsbusinessdaily.com.