Thought-Leadership Piece (PR 535)
DICK’S Sporting Goods Foot Locker Sneaker Truck Campaign
“Preserving the Playing Field”
by Lauren Hobart, President and CEO of DICK’S Sporting Goods
When I joined my first softball team at four years old, my head coach spent an entire practice teaching all the players how to properly approach playing the game and preserving it for the next team. This was before half the team could throw the ball more than ten feet, and before the other half stopped staring at the sun long enough to know which base to run to first or who was on our team or what was for snack afterwards.
We were taught to keep our dugout clean, throw away any trash, square away our uniform so we looked like we cared, and respect the dirt and grass that made up what would become my favorite place the next 18 years of my life until I stopped playing at the end of my college career.
I never forgot those lessons, and I did my best to bring them to every team I joined. It just made sense to me: You respect the field, you respect your teammates, and you leave the ballfield better than you found it.
And the funny thing is, it turns out that Little League lessons apply to a lot more than youth softball. It applies to parks, forests, lakes, rivers, hiking trails, and pretty much every place people go to play, explore, compete, or just get outside for a while.
At DICK’S Sporting Goods, we spend our days helping people do exactly that. We sell the gear that sends people out the door and into the world. Softball gloves, soccer balls, hiking boots, fishing rods, bikes, kayaks, tents, you name it. If it gets people moving or outside, there’s a good chance it passed through one of our stores.
But here’s the thing about selling equipment for outdoor recreation. All of those activities depend on something that’s easy for many of us to overlook.
A place to actually do them.
Fishing is less exciting when the lake is polluted. Hiking loses its charm when the trail looks like a racoon got into a trash bin filled with confetti and glitter (I’ve seen it happen). And nobody has ever looked at a soccer field covered in trash and thought, “Perfect, let’s play.”
That’s why sustainability matters to us. It’s why it matters to me and to my family. It’s basic common sense that a four-year-old on a T-ball field can fully comprehend and imprint for the rest of his or her life.
If you care about sports and respect them, you take care of the field.
The same way my Little League coach made us clean up the dugout before we stretched and warmed up as well as after practice or games before we got our snacks, companies that benefit from outdoor recreation have a responsibility to help protect the spaces where those activities happen.
Now, I’ll be the first to admit that sustainability discussions can get a little… theatrical. Companies mash ‘Environmental, Social, or Governance’ on just about everything they can get their hands on and build a report that no one reads. It dilutes the message, and it comes across as lacking institutional fortitude to do what a child knows to do: be accountable, pick up after yourself, and leave it better for the next team.
Meanwhile, most people just want clean parks, healthy forests, and water that doesn’t look like Yogi Berra rinsed his gums out after playing a double-header with his favorite long-cut tobacco.
I’ll tell you another lesson built into my first softball lesson that makes this a homerun concept: small actions add up. Just like in softball, the concept of “get ‘em on, get ‘em over, get ‘em in” is a series of small positive actions to help teams score runs. Small ball can sometimes result in big wins. Get runners on base, move them into scoring position, put the ball in play to get them home (easier said than done, but you get the point).
More importantly, small actions reinforce a simple principle that athletes already understand better than most: the game only works if the field is still there.
Sports have always been about more than winning. They’re about tradition, teamwork, and the idea that you’re part of something that existed before you showed up and will hopefully still be around long after you’re gone. The outdoors works the same way.
So whether someone is throwing a baseball in a neighborhood park, casting a line into a quiet lake, or hiking a trail with their kids on a Saturday morning, the goal is the same one my coach taught me decades ago. The same one I’m sharing with you now (albeit with less yelling, less tobacco, but more urgency).
Preserve the playing field. Take care of it.
And leave it a little better for the next team.
Strategy Note
I’ve always used either humor or sentimentality when I’m writing for my CEO or CMO whether it’s for internal communications to just our employees or external communications for our consumers. This thought leadership piece frames sustainability through a universally understood concept of sportsmanship and respect. I opened with a softball story and extended the metaphor of ‘preserving the playing field’ throughout, connecting environmental priorities with timeless lessons learned and accountability for your fellow human. I find it easier to write a message to an audience and have it truly digested and implanted if the conduit used is something that we’ve all experienced at some point. We were all kids. We all had adults in our childhood (parents or coaches or teachers or relatives) who taught us lessons about taking care of what’s in our possession, however fleeting, and making sure other people following us can enjoy it, too.
The theme of ‘preserving the playing field’ aligns naturally with the company’s brand position. DICK’S Sporting Goods equips people to participate in sports and outdoor recreation, which depend on healthy, natural environments and well-maintained public spaces. Framing sustainability as stewardship of the playing field reinforces the company’s role in preserving the environments where sports and recreation take place, while positioning the brand as a responsible participant in the long-term future of outdoor activity.