Tennessee announced a new “transformative partnership” with Pilot for Neyland Stadium on Tuesday morning.
The multi-year partnership between Tennessee and Pilot “preserves the iconic venue’s name and enhances the stadium experience for future generations. Under the terms of the agreement, which is slated for up to 20 years and could extend further, the names of Neyland Stadium and Shields-Watkins Field will remain unchanged.”
Pilot is also the new presenting partner for the Neyland Stadium renovation project.
Moving forward, the tagline for Tennessee’s stadium will be: “Neyland Stadium. Home of the Vols. Proudly preserved by Pilot.”
Tennessee released a video to supplement the announcement on Tuesday featuring Tennessee Athletics Director Danny White and Pilot CEO Adam Wright. The video featured a quick conversation between the two men as various highlight packages of Tennessee’s past and present were shown.
The overarching storyline of the announcement and video on Tuesday was the preservation of the Neyland Stadium name. While Pilot does become the stadium sponsor with the agreement, Tennessee will retain the names of Neyland Stadium and Shields-Watkins Field.
“It’s a preservation partnership,” Wright said. “We’re going to preserve the history of the stadium and not rename it – the field or the stadium. And that’s different. And then to make that commitment over 10, 20 years, extremely important to us. Important to you. I think it’s the right thing to do.”
More from RTI: Tennessee Announces Corporate Sponsorship With Pilot At Neyland Stadium
There’s been a rise in corporate sponsorships in college athletics in the last few years with Tennessee being no exception. Prior to the 2023-2024 basketball season, Tennessee renamed its basketball arena Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center in a 10-year partnership with Food City. The sponsorship did raise some concern from fans that Tennessee would have its sights set on Neyland Stadium next. While those rumors were partially correct, they didn’t factor in Tennessee’s ultimate desire to retain the Neyland Stadium and Shields-Watkins Field name.
“The original innovator was General Neyland,” White said in the video. “It was almost 100 years ago when he had the vision for a 100,000-seat stadium. He was an engineer. He was designing things, working with folks on what this whole thing could be.”
“General Neyland, obviously, was a man of great courage,” Wright followed up with. “I think it takes great courage to cast vision and then surround yourself with people and to do the work and see that vision come to pass. And this is a courageous step.”
Wright says in the video that the agreement was to always keep the naming rights, highlighting that the modern-day use of “innovation” is often perceived as doing something, or changing something, to become brand new. Tennessee and Pilot aim to uphold the history of Neyland Stadium by enhancing the fan experience around it.
“The tradition and the pageantry, people are so proud of the memories in this stadium, but it doesn’t have to be as uncomfortable as it was in the past,” White said. “We can make the concourses a little better and we’re in the process of doing that. We can make the fan experience better. We talk about it in our meetings all the time, we can’t take the best fan base in the country for granted.”
Tennessee’s announcement and supplemental video on Tuesday show the care that went into this deal for the fans, the athletics department, the university, and the players. Rocky Top Insider will have more on the announcement after a press conference on Tuesday afternoon.
“This will always be Neyland Stadium,” White said. “It is now, always has been, always will be. But Pilot can be a huge part in preserving that and help us reinvest in our fan experience and make sure that it stays Neyland Stadium for decades to come.”
Check out the four-minute announcement video below.
