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Abstract: Tailgating is an American football pregame activity prevalent on university grounds and surrounding areas. This research specifically investigates generational differences of game-day tailgating rituals at a Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) southeastern master level university. Survey data from 753 active tailgaters (Baby boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z) was analyzed using ANOVA procedures. Findings show that tailgaters are mostly motivated by team identification, followed by escape, and spending time with friends. However, generational differences are observed for spending time with family, identifying with the home team, and the desire to attend home games. In addition, in terms of game-day rituals, while the younger generations are more fluid/ nomadic in their tailgating locations and engage in drinking games, the older generations stick to the tried and true rituals such as setting up a tailgating spot decorated with team colors and cooking. Implications for teams, universities, and related community businesses are discussed.
Keywords: Tailgating rituals, cohort theory, U.S. collegiate football, motivating factors, consumer behavior, marketing communications strategy
Tailgating is an American pre-game ritual that takes place prior to college and professional sporting events, in particular American football games. It brings fans and spectators together as a temporary brand community that socializes and focuses around a particular team (Bradford and Sherry, 2017). Although some aspects of tailgating have been studied among American football fans (Drenten et al., 2009; Gibson et al., 2002) and Australian Football League fans (Neale et al., 2008; McDonald and Karg, 2014), most articles have been exploratory in nature. The majority of studies have not focused on specific target markets or demographics that may be of interest for a team's fan management in terms of relationship marketing, or for universities in terms of targeting current students, alumni, and local residents by offering valuable game-day experiences. As fan bases of college football is quite age diverse, there is limited knowledge of younger versus older generations' tailgating rituals. In terms of rituals, most research has focused on interviewing highly dedicated tailgaters that have supported a team for multiple years. Collectively extant research has found community, pre- and post-game rituals, and team identification to be important aspects of tailgating (McDonald and Karg, 2014; Gibson et al., 2002). Other motivating factors of interest are feelings...