Case Studies in Sport Business Marketing

Brenda G. Pitts, PhD, is an internationally renowned name in sport business management, particularly in sport marketing and in sport management program development. She is currently a professor of sport management, the director of the Dr. R. Cooter Sport Business Research Center, and a program director at Georgia State University in Atlanta. Dr. Pitts has also served as a consultant in sport marketing for various sport businesses, including the Georgia Dome in Atlanta (with clients such as the Professional Bull Riders Inc., Supercross, and the Atlanta Falcons), Tallahassee Soccer Association, and the NCAA.

In research, Dr. Pitts is distinguished as a Dr. Earle F. Zeigler Scholar and one of the first research fellows of the North American Society for Sport Management (NASSM), where in 2004 she received the Garth Paton Distinguished Service Award in recognition of meritorious service. She is author or coauthor of six sport marketing textbooks, editor of and a contributing author in three of the Sport Marketing Association's books of papers, and author of numerous publications and presentations. Her work has been published in scholarly journals such as Sport Management Education Journal, Journal of Sport Management, Sport Marketing Quarterly, Journal of Vacation Marketing, International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship, Women in Sport and Physical Activity, Sport Management and Related Topics (SMART) Journal, and International Journal of Sport Management.

Dr. Pitts was an editorial board member (1991-1998) and later co–editor in chief of The Sport Management Library (1998-2000), a project that produced more than 20 textbooks in sport management. She serves on the review boards of Sport Marketing Quarterly, Sport Management and Related Topics (SMART) Journal, and Sport Management Review (Australia); she previously served on the review board of International Journal of Sport Management. She has served as a guest editor for papers for Journal of Sport Management and Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal.

Dr. Pitts enjoys all kinds of sports, with her more recent interest in soccer, golf, boating, volleyball, jogging, tennis, and softball. Her outstanding career in basketball has brought her such awards as the retirement of her high school basketball uniform number; membership in the Club of the University of Alabama; induction into the Athletic Hall of Fame of Huntsville, Alabama; induction into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame of Knoxville, Tennessee; and a nominee for the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Recently, Dr. Pitts has won a couple of golf tournaments but has wisely decided to keep her day job.