Perception

[zephyr]

The reason it keeps getting brought up is because it is important. I get tired of it as well, but, ______, I'm MORE tired of constantly having to deal with this issue due to the lack of resolution. This IS a constant battle. It will ALWAYS be that way if we don't try to get it straightened out sooner rather than later. I agree with HC that this needs to be addressed. The ones who forced this "compromise" down our throats are only too happy to see us bickering among ourselves on this issue. I'd rather we didn't do it so much in public. But, as they say, it is what it is. I choose not to bring it up or comment on it as frequently as HC does, but I feel where he is coming from.

Why is it aggravating? Well, because again the thread was hijacked with the constant complaining about the name issue. We all agree but the problem is that we have to see and hear the rants although they come at poor times when there is nothing that anybody here can do about it. Also, these rants are typically directed at the school for their lack of "marketing" of our preferred name when that is simply not true. This is what typically gets me. If you feel the university is not doing its part in pushing our non-official name, call the school or write them and speak to them about it. It's complaining about the same old things and expecting others to take care of it for you.

[jumboragncajun]

Why is it aggravating? Well, because again the thread was hijacked with the constant complaining about the name issue. We all agree but the problem is that we have to see and hear the rants although they come at poor times when there is nothing that anybody here can do about it. Also, these rants are typically directed at the school for their lack of "marketing" of our preferred name when that is simply not true. This is what typically gets me. If you feel the university is not doing its part in pushing our non-official name, call the school or write them and speak to them about it. It's complaining about the same old things and expecting others to take care of it for you.

Zephyr, I would agree with you 100%, but because this thread is called perception, and under the forum "Name Issues", where it should be, I am not even reading it. Lovely!!

[HoustonCajun]

Why is it aggravating? Well, because again the thread was hijacked with the constant complaining about the name issue. We all agree but the problem is that we have to see and hear the rants although they come at poor times when there is nothing that anybody here can do about it. Also, these rants are typically directed at the school for their lack of "marketing" of our preferred name when that is simply not true. This is what typically gets me. If you feel the university is not doing its part in pushing our non-official name, call the school or write them and speak to them about it. It's complaining about the same old things and expecting others to take care of it for you.

FYI, I've written to the President, AD, and Head football coach. Got no response from HUD, got a thank you from AD, but got a nice note from the President that an outside marketing firm from Chicago was hired to do athletic branding and all of my concerns and suggestions were appreciated and would be passed on to this firm. I later learned that an internal person was hired to do marketing. I asked this person about athletics branding and he inferred that it was not high on his list. So, just maybe continuing to point out instances where athletic branding is needed just might result in people closer to the university reading them bringing them to the attention of the right person or people. If you are not one of those people, ignore. If you are, please identify to people who need to know at UL. It is meant as constructive identification and not complaining. We don't know what might have been done or not done
behind the scenes. Unfortunately, all we see is the end product.

[zephyr]

FYI, I've written to the President, AD, and Head football coach. Got no response from HUD, got a thank you from AD, but got a nice note from the President that an outside marketing firm from Chicago was hired to do athletic branding and all of my concerns and suggestions were appreciated and would be passed on to this firm. I later learned that an internal person was hired to do marketing. I asked this person about athletics branding and he inferred that it was not high on his list. So, just maybe continuing to point out instances where athletic branding is needed just might result in people closer to the university reading them bringing them to the attention of the right person or people. If you are not one of those people, ignore. If you are, please identify to people who need to know at UL. It is meant as constructive identification and not complaining. We don't know what might have been done or not done
behind the scenes. Unfortunately, all we see is the end product.

One last retort before I follow Jumbo's lead. In all due fairness, these are certainly viewed as complaints since this continuously comes up in lots of threads such as this where it should not even be an issue. Also, I know that you find this an important issue as do many but again, if you've written those who are supposed to be the ones who can do something about it with no response, why keep lugging it along here? The fact is, our name issues will not progress to a level you would like until we do something about it on the field or court....Period. We seem to get a lot further along when you have success to use as a springboard for such issues. AND, while I'd love to use Louisiana much more for our branding, our name is what it is at the current time so I'm curious to know what you truly expect to happen.

[BananaHammock]

Jesus Christ! Another damn thread dedicated to someone calling us another name than we prefer. We all get your point but you need to call people at the University who make decisions instead of complaining here.

You want people to call us Louisiana? When your football team has been nonexistent for 30+ years people will call you what they want. Become relevant for more than a couple of years and people will start to pay attention to our program and figure out our real name.

[HoustonCajun]

One last retort before I follow Jumbo's lead. In all due fairness, these are certainly viewed as complaints since this continuously comes up in lots of threads such as this where it should not even be an issue. Also, I know that you find this an important issue as do many but again, if you've written those who are supposed to be the ones who can do something about it with no response, why keep lugging it along here? The fact is, our name issues will not progress to a level you would like until we do something about it on the field or court....Period. We seem to get a lot further along when you have success to use as a springboard for such issues. AND, while I'd love to use Louisiana much more for our branding, our name is what it is at the current time so I'm curious to know what you truly expect to happen.

Look, this thread needs to end, but I want a final statement in all of this. Here is what I posted:

Senior Bowl South Team practice just started and they immediately talked about two top corners, Bentley and a guy from Furman. Problem is they called both as coming from small schools, i.e. 1AA schools - Furman and Louisiana Lafayette (the Lafayette was included even if it is deleted here). These guys didn't do their home work and appear to be winging it on facts about UL, but then Louisiana Lafayette does sound like a small time school.

My post had to do with NFL people referring to us as a small school, i.e. 1AA school as they lumped us with Furman. Other than saying that they didn't do their homework about UL and that Louisiana Lafayette does sound small school, which is probably why they lumped us with Furman, where am I complaining and making a huge deal about this? The fact that someone took this as a major indictment of our university's failure to brand us as Louisiana and chose to call me out for making a huge deal about it is rediculous. Yes, I want to see us referred to as Louisiana and we just lost 2 major platforms to recognize us that way in the Bowl Game and Senior Bowl. But, did I say anything about that in my original post? No. Did I complain about our lack of branding and marketing? No. Some people see a simple comment about what we were called and blow it all out of proportion. Now that simple one paragraph was made into a separate thread by others, not me, who found a need to overly complain about a simple comment. Some people actually responded that they want to be informed of these things and, BTW, that was all I was doing. Informing. Not criticizing. My infrequent postings of negative references to UL that I happen to find are somehow turned into EVERY post I make is about the name issue. Why can't people simply read something, especially something they agree with like we ALL want to be known as LOUISIANA, and not get bent out of shape because a reference is made to it. No comments and it dies with the one post.

What do I expect to happen with my posts? I've written to UL leaders and sent a full report on specific suggestions regaring marketing and branding of our university. No ones knows just what they will do or what they are doing at this time. My posts are just meant to enlighten people of instances outside of Lafayette where we are either referred to in an manner other than what we request or that we are at a level we are not, as in my original post on this thread regarding a 1AA reference. As I said, some people want to know about these things. Some obviously do not. These posts do not have any bearing on what UL will do in regards to marketing and branding any more than all of the posts regarding what game plan or strategies Coach Hud should have used. But, we feel a need to post our opinions anyway. Why not just leave it at that? If someone likes what they read and thanks the poster for the information, then it was worth the post. If no one comments on it, it goes away.

Let someone from another school come here and laugh at our name debacle and call us something we don't want to be called and out comes the army to defend UL. Let an alumnus of our school point out where these kind of things are happening and instead that person gets attacked. The internal damning of fellow Cajuns and infighting on this board is alarming and I'm not just talking about me and the name issue. No need to go to an LSU or LA Tech board to see how they are thrashing UL and our posters on their boards. We get that right here from our own people. Sort of takes the fun out of participating and voicing an opinion on things that will actually move UL forward.

[wcd35]

Just saying, but if it was Florida Atlantic or Troy or Central Michigan instead of Furman, it would have been the exact same statement. Anything not BCS or mid-majors that knock off BCS teams regularly (Boise St) would get lumped in as a smaller school. Probably could have worded their comment differently. Perception changes with wins and conference affiliation. I dont think the name made us fall into that small school classification. Just plain Louisiana would get small-schooled by those commentators. I think that is, more or less, how most people on here view it.

That's all. We dont really need to keep this going.

[zephyr]

Just saying, but if it was Florida Atlantic or Troy or Central Michigan instead of Furman, it would have been the exact same statement. Anything not BCS or mid-majors that knock off BCS teams regularly (Boise St) would get lumped in as a smaller school. Probably could have worded their comment differently. Perception changes with wins and conference affiliation. I dont think the name made us fall into that small school classification. Just plain Louisiana would get small-schooled by those commentators. I think that is, more or less, how most people on here view it.


That's all. We dont really need to keep this going.

Thank You!