When Naples billionaire David Hoffmann bought the Florida Everblades minor league hockey team in 2019, he immediately poured money into upgrading its Estero home, Hertz Arena.
Now, Hoffmann is at it again.
Since the Everblades won the 2023 Kelly Cup, the ECHL’s championship trophy and the team’s second consecutive title, Hoffmann invested more than $1 million in making upgrades for both fans and advertisers who support the team.
A multimillion-dollar digital-ribbon display board replaced the 66 backlit advertising signs that rimmed the top of the inside of the arena since the inaugural season in 1998. This gives the Everblades more flexibility with advertising inside the arena, and it gives the advertisers a more prominent display, said Scott Bryant, president and chief financial officer of the Everblades and Hertz Arena.
“The 66, static, black-lit signs had old-school, fluorescent bulbs behind them,” Bryant said. “The new ribbon board has 3.9 megapixels. It’s the latest and greatest.
“The great thing about the ribbon board is we can change it up instantly. It’s not static. Advertisers can change it up without changing the structure. We still have old-school advertising on the ice. This is an improvement in every way.”
In addition to the ribbon board, the Everblades replaced two outdated video boards with four new corner boards.
“What that does, is it allows us to have a seamless fan experience,” Bryant said. “This is top-notch. This is NHL-like. The highest level.”
The Hoffmann ownership group wasn’t finished, either. In addition to upgrading the marketing experience, it upgraded the fan experience, Bryant said, by adding the Fanlympia and an indoor, floating blimp, which is on order.
“We reinvest in the business,” Bryant said. “We reinvest in the team to keep it top-notch and to keep our fans up to date and coming back.”
The Everblades use an Olympia-branded ice resurfacing machine instead of the better-known Zamboni brand, which is why it’s called a Fanlympia instead of a “Fanboni,” as other teams have had.
It’s a decommissioned ice resurfacing machine that is made specifically to transport up to eight fans, plus the driver and team mascot Swampee around the ice three times per game. The Fanlympia will travel after warmups, after the end of the first period and after the end of the second period, just before the real Olympia does its job of preparing the ice for game action.
This season, $320 will allow eight fans to ride the Fanlympia. The price includes eight game tickets.
“It gives us another element,” Everblades General Manager Craig Brush said. “When Dave Hoffmann went to our playoff game in Toledo a couple of years ago, he saw that and he saw the blimp, and he said we’ve got to get those things.”
A 22-foot blimp that will float around the arena remains on order. It will further enhance marketing efforts with the ability to drop flyers and coupons to fans.
Last season, the Everblades ranked seventh out of 28 ECHL teams in attendance, averaging 6,009 fans in 36 regular season games, drawing a total of 216,320 fans for 2022-23.
“It’s made the building look like brand new,” Brush said of the upgrades. “The backlit signs were something from a different era. And the ribbon board is great for our advertisers and great for the fans.”
The Hoffmann ownership group’s spending spree has been a morale boost not just for fans and advertisers, Brush said, but for the employees as well.
“It’s been wonderful,” Brush said of the new era. “We were in a selling mode, so we weren’t in an investment mode. And Dave came in. The story I like to tell is we closed the deal on a Thursday, and I came back, and all the suites had been gutted. And they had been redone in 30 days. He moves fast. He’s very decisive about what he likes and what he doesn’t like. And this is the result.”
