Springfield, MA - The American Hockey League has named Norva Riddell, senior vice president of sales and marketing for True North Sports & Entertainment and the Manitoba Moose, the winner of the league's Ken McKenzie Award for the 2007-08 season. Recognizing the important role played by team management in building a successful franchise, the award is presented annually to an AHL team executive who most successfully promotes his or her own club.
Riddell is responsible for corporate sponsorship sales, season ticket and group sales and suites for the Moose and the MTS Centre, and oversees the Moose marketing department and the implementation and execution of the team's marketing strategies. Her efforts and leadership have helped the Moose remain near the top of the league in ticket sales, ranking second during the 2007-08 regular season (7,807 per game) and first during the 2008 Calder Cup Playoffs (7,665).
Recently, True North merged its sales and marketing teams into one department, headed by Riddell. She now oversees the organization's marketing, promotions, game production and multimedia efforts, and has spearheaded a customer research, profiling and branding project that will help develop the Moose's marketing campaign for the 2008-09 season.
The AHL's Ken McKenzie Award, first presented in 1978, honors Ken McKenzie, the founder and long-time publisher of The Hockey News and a 1997 media honoree by the Hockey Hall of Fame as the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award winner. Mr. McKenzie, the NHL's first publicity director and creator of its first media guide, passed away in 2003.
Previous winners of the AHL's Ken McKenzie Award include Mike Emrick, Roy Mlakar, Bruce Landon, Rick Peckham, Dave Strader, Dale Arnold, John Forslund and Glenn Stanford.
