Las Vegas ad firm backs off ‘Madness’ slogan

The slogan may sound catchy — “The Madness Begins Here” — but the ad firm for Las Vegas’ public tourism agency doesn’t want to legally poke the bear known as the NCAA.

That’s because March Madness, the well-known nickname of the NCAA’s basketball tournament, is a trademarked part of the American sports lexicon — and “The Madness Begins Here” pitch in Las Vegas could be seen as a legal infringement.

So, R&R Partners, the ad agency for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, decided this week to not use its proposed “The Madness Begins Here” slogan to hype the frenzy of March basketball in Las Vegas, which is hosting four college conference tournaments at three arenas followed by the major sports book attraction of the NCAA national tourney.

R&R didn’t want a legal tussle with the NCAA, which probably would have argued that “The Madness Begins Here” slogan infringes on its trademarked March Madness. The NCAA is vigilant about protecting its trademarked slogans such as March Madness and has been known to send cease-and-desist missives to parties it perceives as violating its trademarked slogans.

R&R will look at opportunities to jointly promote the conference tournaments and NCAA’s Big Dance, the 68-team national tournament that is a popular sports book event for Las Vegas.

“We are very excited about the marketing opportunities presented by the ‘Madness Begins Here’ and think it is a great opportunity to promote the four conference basketball tournaments, the NCAA Tournament and Las Vegas,” R&R Executive Vice President Rob Dondero said.

“However, given our long-term and mutually beneficial partnership with the conferences and the NCAA, we believe a better course of action at this time is to seek future opportunities to jointly promote the NCAA tournaments and Las Vegas using this phrase or possibly other concepts that we may mutually develop,” Dondero said.

An unprecedented four college basketball conferences are staging their season-ending tournaments in Las Vegas, with the tourney winners getting a ticket to participate in the NCAA tournament: Pac-12 at the MGM Grand Garden (March 13-16); Western Athletic (March 6-11) and West Coast (March 12-16), both at the Orleans Arena; and Mountain West at the Thomas & Mack Center (March 12-16).

NCAA officials could not be reached for comment.

Contact reporter Alan Snel at asnel@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5273.