BROWNS Team is frightful, sales delightful

CLEVELAND (AP) -- The Cleveland Browns haven't won much this season, but the team's marketing department has scored big.
In sharp contrast with the team's 4-11 record and five-game losing streak, sales of team merchandise have risen 67 percent at the NFL's official online store, a league spokesman said.
Analysts say the Browns' playoff berth a season ago and the unveiling of new team logos both contributed to the increase, which was measured by online sales from April to November both years, NFL spokesman Dan Masonson said.
"It's all about marketing, man," Browns offensive lineman Barry Stokes said. "Any change they make to logos is about marketing."
Options, options, options
The only NFL franchise without a logo on its helmet has been busy creating new identities, brushing off old ones and slapping its officially licensed marks on almost anything imaginable.
For example, the Browns are one of 12 teams to offer women's thongs (two-pack for $19.99) at the league's online store.
The Web site offers more than 240 Browns items, ranging in price from a $9.99 money clip to a $339 Gill Cow Napa jacket.
The sale of NFL-licensed merchandise is a $3.1 billion industry, Masonson said. The league does not disclose sales figures for individual franchises. Only the top 10 sellers are released in order.
The league's two best apparel performers this season have been the Oakland Raiders and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who played in the last Super Bowl. Dallas, Green Bay and Pittsburgh round out the top five.
"There is a direct correlation between merchandise sales and on-field success," Masonson said.
The Browns were among the top 10 in the late 1980s. They finished third in 1999, the year the franchise returned to Cleveland.
Bruce Popko, Browns vice president of marketing and development, believes a "breakthrough" year by a team or individual often drives sales.
Browns ownership and management have never considered changing colors or adding a logo to their distinct orange helmets, he said.
"When [late Browns owner] Al Lerner was alive, he was very adamant about keeping the helmets the same," Popko said. "His son, Randy, feels strongly the same way. The orange helmet is our beacon, the symbol with which we begin and end."
New look
But the Browns are adding new logos for other merchandise, such as the capital "B" flanked by brown and orange stripes and encapsulated in a football.
The marketing department also has tweaked its growling Dawg Pound logo and gradually made more use of Brownie, the cartoon insignia popular in the 1950s and '60s.
Reebok has exclusive rights to all apparel worn on NFL sidelines. Coach Butch Davis and members of the Browns staff have modeled the new looks on game days this season.
At home games, it's impossible for cameras to miss logos painted on the field or orange and brown jerseys, sweat shirts, hats, jackets and gloves in the stands.
"Home games are almost like a three-hour-long merchandise informercial," Popko said.