Mavericks jersey Q&A: Alison Panasik on wearing green, possible rebrand, more

The Mavericks have so many jerseys this season that the team still hasn’t even debuted them all. (We’re waiting on the earned jersey, an edition granted to teams in the year following a playoff appearance.) Rather than focusing on just one of them like we did last season with the boundary-pushing city edition, I decided to talk to Alison Panasik, the team’s vice president of merchandise and brand identity, about the various editions seen on the court, the process behind creating and approving them and whether the team could rebrand in the coming years. This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

So there are five jerseys this year. That’s years of work behind the scenes to get everything approved and ready for the start of each season, right?

Absolutely. The time and prep behind even just the submission process to change an upcoming jersey, that process starts two and a half to three years out.

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What are the first steps? How does that process evolve over the three years that it will take?

I kind of know what’s coming. So if there’s some sort of idea that pops up internally or something that me, as someone born and raised in Dallas, might think, “Hey, that’s a really cool city connector or idea for a city edition jersey,” I’ll throw it by (vice president of corporate communications and events) Erin (Finegold White) and be like, “Hey, what if we did this and just planted seeds among other people in the organization with our creative director along those lines?”

The actual official process with the league starts with a creative brief almost three years in advance. The creative deck I sent (Nike) was probably six slides of creative inspiration, in particular to this city edition. (There were) images of different elements that I could visually see being done and woven into a jersey or into the design of a jersey, (and) I was blown away even at the first round of designs. I mean, there’s always going to be tweaks, but there’s usually two rounds of designs, and then you go to first production sample. And, of course, there are months and months and months between all of these benchmarks. But the benchmarks along the way are so critical. Operating two-and-a-half to three years in advance, it’s a “hurry up and wait” process. There’s a lot of benchmarks along the way, but it is so, so, so much fun to work on this.

What is the story and the inspiration behind the city jersey?

Knowing that it was going to be our 40th anniversary and also (knowing) Mark (Cuban) is not too fond of celebrating anniversaries — (he focuses on) larger benchmark ones, like a 50th or 75th — (we knew) we wanted to give it a nod, but not too obvious (of one). So I thought, “Okay, well, if it’s what feels like a celebration, what colors?” And you think of a wedding or an anniversary or trophies. So, immediately, I was like, “Oh, man, it’d be so cool if we could do a white jersey, and have some sort of silver and gold elements.”

And, you know, the Pegasus has stood watch over Dallas for over 100 years, and I see what people are saying on social (about) Dallas elements. I think it’s really important to engage fans in that way to know what do they see as city connectors for the city of Dallas, and even the greater DFW area. What’s there that we can do but (isn’t) so literal? I mean, we could have easily have done a jersey with a giant Pegasus on the front. Everybody would have known that, and it would have been really cool. However, I had more this vision of players taking flight. And if they sort of had wings, what would that look like without being too literal or too fake? So when we went through this process, the creative deck that I sent (Nike) had a lot of elements – like, sneakers with wings, Game of Thrones-type armor. I was originally envisioning, like, wings coming down the back, or maybe the font changing to feel more Romanesque, going down that mythology realm and the story of the Pegasus. The Pegasus, wherever it steps, it springs water. It (gives) hope, inspiration, growth (and) new life. That’s something that Dallas has seen a tremendous amount of in the last 40 years or so. And it is really a challenge to sum up 40 years of our organization in one celebratory element, but I think this is the coolest jersey we’ve done so far.

Was the homage to Luka’s last team (Real Madrid) intentional, or was there a point where you realize this also works as a reference back to their white and gold jerseys?

You know, that was just an amazing coincidence. I would love to take credit for that, but we drafted Luka (on) June 21 of 2018, and I submitted this creative brief over Fourth of July weekend of 2018. I didn’t connect the two. I knew he played for Real Madrid, but I didn’t follow them closely enough to study their uniforms. And we’d been thinking about this concept for a while. We know for years it was going to be our 40th anniversary, that this was probably going to be somewhere along the color story. So it was just an amazing thing that happened.

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I was actually trying to do the math in my head, if Luka had already been drafted when the two-and-a-half years started. That’s so funny the way that the timelines work out when you go back and look at them.

I saw someone sent me a post on social with the jersey side by side, and I was like, “Gosh, can you imagine if that had really been our goal? We crushed it.”

You can tell Luka you meant it the whole time. I’ll keep that secret.

Let me tell you this: (Mavericks CEO) Cynthia Marshall is really good at watching what other teams are doing. (Like), “Where are we? How are we comparing? What’s a bigger strategy?” In one of our one-on-ones, I was like, “Man, it’d be so cool to do this with the players and have their input.” And she made that happen. She was able to let me set up a room, have the jersey set up in the room and let the players vote on what art they liked the best and vote on core designs. It’s informative and knowledgeable for them because they may not know that this takes two-and-a-half to three years. And now that they do, (they’re invested) knowing what’s coming. They’re like, “Oh, now I see why,” because two years ago, they were like, “Ali, when are we going to wear the green?” and I was like, “Only on anniversary years.” But when you share that knowledge, you get them invested in it, and then they get to see it way. It’s like backstage passes or exclusive access when they see that and then get to vote in some elements of it. It just creates this really cool culture and buy-in. And then they’re really so much more proud to wear it because they were able to give their opinion on it.

From the design perspective, how do you make final decisions on small details once you have the larger concept in place. In this case, the players getting input, I think that’s a cool way to make decisions. Even before you get to that point, what’s going through your head with smaller things that could be one or could be the other?

It goes back to this crazy attention to detail. I’ll watch other teams, other jerseys, other designs. And I can tell you specifically there are certain things that are really tough to convey on the court. For example, if it was a colorblock jersey and one half was lighter than the other and you saw them playing on court and running each direction down the court, it would be confusing. (Like), “Wait, is there a third team out there?” Or if there is some sort of line or seam that maybe cuts a little too high on the short, it can mess with your impression of how tall the player is. Even with color palettes – I mean, I’m huge on (them), and we know fans love the green, but a lot of our fan base doesn’t know that we can only wear that green every five years. Every five years, we’re going to blow it out. We’ll buy a ton of it so you can get as much of it as you want. But even in the green jersey process, I went back and studied our original greens, and I really wanted shorter shorts and higher socks. There’s a realm of how far the league and Nike are willing to go on those smaller details. But when it came to the shorts, something that is so iconic about our 1980 shorts is that there is that Chevron on the side where the taping of the blue and light blue connect. In the original design, that connection was gone. And for me, I was like, “No, no, this is essential. This is essential to keep it as close to the original design.” So I pay attention to the really small details. I think that helps tell the story of the jersey, so we’re just trying to push the envelope with Nike and the NBA.

The one other thing that I noticed is just the updated typefaces.

Are you referring specifically to the hardwood classic?

Yeah, the green hardwood classics.

When we went back and studied the hardwood classic, we found that font was actually different, especially with the numbers. This was after the first round of samples had been approved, and I kept looking at it and thinking something is off on that jersey to me. I went back and pulled (historic) things that we had internally and, sure enough, the numbers somehow through those 40 years got switched. So we went back to the original numbers that are a little bit sharper, (a little bit) cleaner. So it does look a little different than the last hardwood classic (five years ago).

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Yeah, that must be what my brain saw differently there. Why do you think that green has so much fan appeal?

I’m an ’80s baby. I grew up as a young girl going to Reunion Arena with my dad to watch the Mavs. The green is just so clean, it relates closely to a lot of colorations in Dallas and it’s a symbol of growth but still (represents) tradition. It’s a different green than any other green in the NBA or other teams that have green. I think there’s something to be said to creating the demand and only having it every five years. It really drives that home, where it’s a fun place to educate fans. I think we’re doing a better job, but we could always be better, I’m sure, of telling these stories and why we did this or why we did that.

You know, Nike and the NBA have given us this amazing platform where the city jersey addition is meant to live outside the realm of your traditional brand story, your hardwood classic you’ll get every five (years), your earned (jersey) you’ll get in a year following the playoffs. But when it comes to city edition, it’s meant to (be) so outside your realm of a fan base that it attracts new fans. A good example was the graffiti we did last year. If you didn’t know the story behind that jersey, I could see fans looking at and going, “What is that?” You know, it’s so outside the box. But that jersey was fantastic. I mean, that jersey bumped us into the top-five teams in the NBA in terms of retail forecasts and sales. So there’s a crazy recipe of this relevancy, authenticity, coolness, and just, like, ear-to-the-street vibes. It’s a really hard recipe to find, but when you get the mix right, fans will let us know.

The one we haven’t talked about, the earned jersey, the one you get after the playoffs: What is that process like? I assume it’s a quicker process because you obviously have to make the playoffs first. So is there already work going on before that?

You have one on deck. It’s fully designed, fully finished, all the production. You know, I actually got my first production sample today (for next season’s earned jersey). So even though we’ve had this designed for two years, just in the pocket since we made the playoffs last year, we’re into full stages of production, of approval and going through the rounds. It’s fun because I’m like, “Man, it’s hard to believe we did that almost three years ago.” There aren’t a ton of design guidelines around earned, but it is very team specific. Ours is in our core colors, a combination of that. And I think it’s going to give fans something different in that the earned program is very short. Ours won’t be available for sale until May 1, so that doesn’t leave you much time to be able to sell it, wear it on court, that sort of thing. But it is fun that it provides an extra jersey for fans.

What’s Mark Cuban like in this process? Famously, he wanted jerseys to go with jeans when he first started the team. Does he step back and provide input occasionally?

I think Mark trusts that we’re going to make it as cool as we possibly can. That Nike – there’s some of the best storytellers in the world, some of the best marketers in the world, there’s a reason they are putting these concepts in place, and really pulling this creative story out of us, which is a huge challenge to do with 30 teams for jerseys each year. Some have five and or even six (if you have an earned jersey and are in your anniversary year). That’s a lot. It’s a huge process to manage. So working with these world-renowned designers, it’s so much fun to do this with them. And I would hope that with Mark, that he sees how much fans love the story. I think it’s creating an emotional connection to our brand. The best compliment we can get is when I am walking down the street, and I see fans (wearing) a current Mavericks jersey. I think Mark sees the connection to that (storytelling) and is starting to understand the importance there. He does weigh in. I mean, he’ll tell me exactly what he thinks. And then my response is by how much we sell.

And then with rebranding, a lot of fans are always interested in the possibility. It’s obviously a very long process, and there’s a lot of input in terms of everybody having to be on board and ready for it. If it gets to the point where the team decides to rebrand, how exciting would that be for you in this coming decade? And do you think there’s any possibility to it?

I wouldn’t ever leave anything out of the realm of possibility. Even in my almost seven years in this job, I have been able to see and experience and accomplish and create some incredible programs that, especially as a woman in sports, you sometimes wouldn’t experience in a lifetime of a job. It’s been unbelievable. So to go through a rebrand, and me as a person who is so passionate about this, I would love to do that at some point in my career. When you think about all the assets, everywhere that logo is and all the assets that we own, it is an unbelievable undertaking. It’s a three-to-five-year process. So knowing that, and also having been with the Mavs when Cynthia Marshall came, with everything we have been doing since the start of the pandemic – these huddles that we’re having, these courageous conversations – that logo means more than just a horse that’s, you know, blue, silver and white. It’s become what I would hope for fans is a connector for them that’s like, “Wow, the Mavs are really standing up and taking action.” We’re doing so much more in the community than we have in the past. But I would like to ask you: What what would you want to see? I mean, would you do you think it’s time for the master rebrand?

I don’t have the same perspective as a fan would, but I have been pro-rebranding for a little bit. I think it’s just a natural evolution that these jerseys have with the design being more or less the same for two decades.

I think it’d be a lot of fun to rebrand (them). The design is the same design that they were wearing when we won the championship in 2011. So I think there is definitely a level of sentiment and a connection there. So I get to play (around with different ideas) in the city edition and statement realms, but I’m always interested to hear what fans have to say, you know, if this is something that they’re super connected to. And you work in this industry, and you talk to a lot of people in sports, and have seen what other teams go through, and (that) there are some that never changed their logo.

Right. I think the interesting thing is that the jerseys came with Dirk, and so they’re so associated with the Dirk era, positively and in a huge way. And as you start thinking about this team, it’s crazy that they went straight from Dirk right into the Luka era. That’s amazing. But I also think you can compartmentalize these eras in your brain, and jerseys are also a good way to do that and push that forward. I think that, and I think that’s an argument a lot of fans have as well.

And I think (that’s) positive, too. We want fans to want to watch our games, to come to our games, to want to be part of this amazing, crazy, fun culture that we have. I mean, the fans are why we do what we do, so we want to keep fans happy. I think it’s so fun when fans are putting out different jersey designs (online). I mean, I really love that because I’m like, “Oh, they don’t know I’m going to be doing that in a couple years.”

(Photo: Glenn James/NBAE via Getty Images)

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