For generations, the University of Oregon has built a brand rooted in innovation, culture, and community both on and off the field. During the 2025 football season, that identity took on a bold new life through the “Grateful Ducks,” a creative partnership with the Grateful Dead that brought together two iconic brands with deeply loyal followings. Ahead of the team’s third College Football Playoff appearance, this week’s episode welcomes Brooke Robinson, Assistant Athletic Director of Marketing & Fan Experience, and Lauren Stanfield, Associate Vice President for Marketing & Brand Strategy, for a behind-the-scenes look at how the iconic collaboration came together.
imPRessions S3 EP 20 Transcript
Kalli
We couldn’t be more grateful than to welcome today’s guests. From the University of Oregon, we’re joined by Lauren Stanfield, Associate Vice President for Marketing and Brand Strategy, and Brooke Robinson, Assistant AD, Marketing and Fan Experience. On the heels of the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary, we couldn’t be more excited to discuss the exciting partnership between the university and the iconic band. The Grateful Ducks campaign fused music, sports, and culture in a way that we rarely see in collegiate marketing. It’s colorful, nostalgic, and authentically Oregon. Today, we’ll discuss how the collaboration came to be. Hi Lauren and Brooke. It’s so great to have you on today.
Lauren
Hi, thanks for having us.
Brooke
Absolutely.
Jenn
Absolutely. This is really exciting for us. I know, like I said, we have a couple of people on staff here that have gone to the University of Oregon, and a couple of Deadheads, particularly Stefan, our boss, is a very big Deadhead. He goes to all the shows, as many that he can. So, this is really fun for us. So, thank you for being here. I kind of want to just start with talking about the intertwined history between the University of Oregon and the Grateful Dead, between Ken Casey graduating from the university in 1957 and just the many shows that the dead have performed in both Autzen and MacArthur Court. This collaboration is awesome and obviously it makes complete sense. So, can you take us from the beginning on how this sort of came to fruition?
Lauren
Sure, I can go. Brooke, add anything if I’m forgetting. So, we started, our partnership started with this really wonderful kind of high-end collegiate apparel company, Class Trip. They are giant Deadheads. They have the licensing rights actually to use the Dead’s IP in collegiate apparel. So, we had kind of started with this, wouldn’t it be great to have an apparel collection? They’re, you know, it’s something our fans really love. And then it started and turned into a Nike shoe, which was amazing. And then last winter or so, we were at a basketball game together, all talking about, we have to do more. This project is just like ripe with beautiful, authentic stories. It’s creative, it’s bold. It’s, you know, it’s really got an opportunity for us to collaborate, and everything is sort of history from there, a little bit of a whirlwind. It went fast and we kept calling this project the snowball project because everybody just kept saying yes, like, well, what if we did this? Okay, let’s try it. And it was just a really fun and exciting project. And I think the thing that made it maybe most special was just that it really was authentic. There’s such a legacy here. The Dead call this kind of their home away from home. Obviously, the connection with the Kesey family and everything there is just beautiful. I mean, the Grateful Dead actually performed concerts at Autzen Stadium that helped us expand the stadium. So, there’s been a lot of fun history, and it just really took off.
Brooke
Definitely. There has been some, I think we originally took it as this would be something the fans could do, and we weren’t sure how the team side of it would be involved. But in my career, I’ve kind of looked for the right place and the right time to be able to do this. I love the Dead as well. And like Lauren said, everything just felt like it kept coming together to make a bigger snowball.
Kalli
I love that. And it’s interesting that you said, obviously, the Dead’s fans span generations, but their core audience predates most of the current students. So, how did you connect the older Deadheads with the younger Ducks to make this campaign fit everybody and relevant to everyone?
Brooke
Yeah, there’s a really popular book in the sport marketing world called Brands Win Championships and talks about the philosophy of like, if a team gets behind the release of a uniform or a project in general that the fans typically take it better, and it gives you that street cred that you need. We needed the authentic story to make sense to our general fan base, especially our older fan base, but we needed it to feel, for a lack of better terms, cool, for it to really echo with a student audience and even younger, and especially where we boil it down to, where it’s all about recruiting for us at the end of the day, whether it’s students or student athletes. For myself, I went to the Dead Forever show, it’s The Sphere, and I was in line for merch behind a group of about 20 college-age guys. And I was like, wow, this has really gone even past myself, that they’re really into, at the bare minimum, not just the music, but the IP. And they love the tie-dye shirts, like the show shirts or the Steal Your Face logo. And all of that is really resonated right now with that demographic.
Lauren
Yeah, I would say maybe a couple other things we did. We needed the apparel line to really resonate with a lot of generations. So, you’ll notice like some of the apparel that was created. We really tried to make it unique for different audiences. Eugene is such a funky town, and it’s just something our students sort of naturally embrace around here. So, I don’t think it was necessarily a hard thing to get, but there was some education that needed to happen. And we did work to sort of bring our students in. We made it part of homecoming that week. There were plenty of opportunities for them to tie-die their own stuff. I think one of my favorite things we did, and I’ll give a lot of credit to our friends at Class Trip for helping us make this connection, but Brooke at the tailgate has, for our fans, has an opportunity for a DJ or a band to play, and that can make that sort of fan experience really fun. And so, we worked with LP Giobbi, who’s just this brilliant DJ. She’s from Eugene. She loves this place. She was raised by Deadheads. She’s just unconventional in her own right and has this like glorious spirit. Well, she’s very good friends with Joey Harrington, who of course also plays the piano and like they just got up and gave the show for our fans. And I think it was a really neat way for students to connect in with this really wonderful DJ and somebody who’s just from here and younger and really gets the vibe of this music and the community. And so that was something I was really proud of just bringing in as well. Brooke had to do all the technical work to get all that to pull off. But like, my gosh, was it wonderful to have her.
Jenn
This is so cool. What a fun job. And kind of on the same vein, we know that the University of Oregon is no stranger to innovation, right? There’s been a long history of… redefining sports through culture. And going back to like kind of the tie-dye shirts, I want to bring up the uniforms. So, I want to know how you think, well, how did this collaboration sort of impact the college football world the way that so many other previous Oregon uniforms have? And how do you rank it amongst your personal favorites? Because I know there’s a long lineage of it.
Brooke
Yeah, I’m fortunate that I’m friends with a lot of my counterparts at some major universities. And of course, as soon as we announce, I hear from some of them that are like, oh, great, my head coach is going to ask for this now.
Jenn
Of course.
Brooke
Yeah, and imitation’s a form of flattery, right? So, we love that. I think what comes down to really the philosophy here is that we want to be the first to do things. And that really comes to that innovation line, right? We want to be the first to do things. We want to do things that are the step ahead. We’re not just trying to do what we think is trendy right now. We want to create the trend. So whether it was the student athletes designing the uniform that looked like the Oregon duck mascot, or it was the eggshell uniforms, or a really a big fan favorite, but also something that meant a lot to our team, the Ohana uniform about five or so years ago. There’s a long history of things that have had stories to it. Our Stomp Out Cancer uniform last year that the head coach’s wife designed in their family and meant something personal to them. So sometimes it’s high tech and it wants to look like it’s from the future. And sometimes it’s just something that’s very personal to us, and we don’t really care what other people perceive it as because it means what it means to us. So, this was no stranger to that, right? It was an opportunity to be part of it. Typically, our uniforms are within a three-year plan or so. This was not originally within that. So, it’s definitely a whirlwind to catch up to that. But what a great opportunity for our team to be able to wear that and incorporate it into different elements. I felt like it was just enough. It was definitely a polarizing release that you either loved or hated it, or you wanted more tie-dye, or it was just enough that it was just the numbers. But I think our team really, really got to where they loved that look and the incorporation of the Dancing Ducks and the Steal Your Face logo with the bold swoosh, and it just really gave it a unique touch that could only happen here.
Kalli
I actually saw a couple of pictures of the uniform before, and it looked amazing.
Jenn
It’s so cool.
Kalli
Like it, I didn’t know what to expect when I was like, when I was thinking like, oh, I’m going to search it. And it’s, if you haven’t seen it, please Google it. It is amazing. And just, you know, talking about just the uniforms, you know, Nike is inarguably the premier brand in sports. And in many ways, Oregon is the premier brand in collegiate athletics. So, you know, together the reimagined Steal Your Face Duck and tie dye uniforms quickly became fan favorites. Like I said, I just saw it myself and I’m not even a Deadhead and I’m like, this is really cool. So, kind of how did the creation of that come to be? And was it difficult to combine the diamond plates and the wings of the generation O uniforms? Like who handles this process? Does Nike handle it, or does it fall exclusively on the university?
Lauren
I’ll start and Brooke can add anything. I mean, like all good projects, this one started with smart people doing smart things. So, I think the groundwork was already there. We had some shared values and the history and the drive to kind of push boundaries with our friends at Nike. And I really believe like when people are open to these types of things, we have such open-minded team that want to be innovative, want to be creative. When they sit at a table and kind of share the like what ifs and how could wes and what’s the intention or the story behind this, just great things happen. I think it’s fair to say that this one happened on a timeline that we probably can’t repeat very often. It was a rush to get us there, and I’m really pleased with the results. Even considering the timeline, I think we did the right amount of tie-dye. This is definitely my favorite uniform. The only thing I want for Christmas is like a frame to put it in. It’s just a fun process to get through. And it really happens with the equipment team and athletics, working with our athletes, working with Nike to say, okay, you know, what’s us? What do we want to do? What pushes the boundaries? And obviously our fans were begging for it the moment we announced a tie-dye out and all the AI-generated versions of what we could have done just were like permeating the social sphere, which was pretty fun to just watch people geek out and get creative on.
Brooke
I think we had the joy of being able to sit back from when we announced it on July 30th to just wear tie-dye. We let people spiral out until we announced it fully the week of the game, which is typically our cadence if we unveil an alternate uniform. But to be able to see what everyone else’s ideas of what we were doing, it’s the marketing dream, to get people to talk about you without you having to do the work. So that was special to see.
Jenn
Absolutely. Can you talk a little bit about the fan reaction? Just because, I mean, this is so innovative. And I know you were saying before, previously, it could be a little polarizing in terms of what people like and how they react to it. So, were there any headlines? Were there fan moments? Were there social polls? Like, was there anything that really struck out to you that really captured the spirit of what you were trying to do?
Brooke
From our lens, there was really like two release dates. There was July 30th when we announced for fans to wear tie-dye as part of our color schedule. And then there was the week of uniform release that Sunday. And on July 30th, when we announced that, like I said, people just really, what does this mean? Who’s coming? Is there a concert? What all is entailed with this? This is so cool. It’s a joy for me to see other people tag their universities in it and say, why aren’t we doing this? So, I love seeing that side of it. And then when we released the uniform the week of and people are like, wow, this is really special, just to be able to see this come to fruition, actual tangible lens of, oh, they did a uniform and oh, there’s retail to come with it. They don’t need to know the behind the scenes of the hurry up offense there, but just for them to see that. And when we announced on July 30th, we had a 30-second teaser video. It’s really just wear tie-dye, Althea is playing in the background. Personal note for me there, that’s my favorite Dead song, but it had over a million views in 24 hours just on Twitter alone. So that was really incredible. Pre-orders of the shirt that we had were huge numbers the first day. And then those numbers that continued to snowball to come back to that the week of the game as well.
Lauren
Yeah, I really enjoyed all the comments we had on the uniform release. I think the thing that was so special for me was we just have such a knowledgeable fan base and the number of people that were breaking down the tiny details in the actual uniform was really special. Like, okay, they totally get it. They understand all of these brands and what we just did here. And I thought that was really exciting. I enjoyed like just hearing the personal anecdotes of like, oh my gosh, did they just turn the Steal Your Face into a duck? Yes, they did. Or is that a Nike swoosh in there. And all of those things meant something to us for the folks that were working on the project. And so when you get the fan reaction, and obviously like, I think we had a 90% sell through on the jersey in the first two or three days, like that’s just, you know, you did something right when the behavior is sort of matching that. And that was exciting.
Kalli
To have a reaction like that is really amazing. And I know you’ve mentioned a couple that there were some comments and some social media. Was there anything that really stood out and captured the spirit of what you were trying to do, whether it was a headline, a fan moment, or a social post that really just, that you were like, yes, like this is, they get it. Like, this is how I know.
Brooke
I think for me as a Deadhead, but also a sneakerhead, it was really cool to see some of the big sites like Soul Retriever, things like that, talking about the game and not just the shoe reviews. So those were really, I have all those screenshots because I love saving the receipts. And those were amazing things for me to say about like how big of a party this game was. And they had no obligation to cover the game, right? It could be everything that leads up to it or just even the retail side of it. But those were incredible for me to see, just the little details that we did throughout the game. And people who may never follow Oregon football before were following it that day. I think one of the biggest ones outside of us was FS1 really leaned into the production side of it as well. So, you felt like you were there, whether you were in Autzen Stadium or you were at home with the use of the music and the graphics. And some of their posts from that were really special to see.
Lauren
I think you were a little bit more dry if you were at home. If you were home watching the game, you didn’t have a poncho on, but it was like a party in the rain and it was so nice. I think my favorite headline; this was just like a personal goal. We really wanted to land this product in some kind of major fashion outlets for media. And I really loved GQ had this headline about the Grateful Dead and Oregon Ducks jammed on a psychedelic Nike Air Max 90. And for me, I was just like, yep, those are all the things. And that just felt really good to read that headline and that it had happened. And like, we know the exposure and those type of things is really wonderful. But one of my favorite things about our brand is like, we can just cross over like that. Some higher ed brands can’t do that. You’re really like sort of stagnant. Like Oregon plays outside of higher ed. Like it’s okay for us to be in GQ or Sports Illustrated in the same day. Like we can do those things here, and we’re excited to do that. We have a lot of investment from our leadership to be working that way. And it’s fun. It makes our jobs more fun. It makes it more fun for the fans, and we reach new people to sort of bring them into to the community. And so, I think the GQ headline was probably one of my favorite parts.
Jenn
I love that. And you’re right. I think that Oregon is something so special that a lot of other colleges just don’t do. And the way you could kind of capture these really cool cultural moments is something that my college certainly didn’t do, so it’s really fascinating just to kind of talk to you and get some of those behind the scenes. And then just working with Nike, which is iconic in itself. And it wasn’t the only collaboration. You worked with Class Trip, Rhino Records, Fanatics. You know, we mentioned before, the Kesey family. They were also a very integral part of the campaign. So how did the logistics in working with these partners, how did you coordinate that, while keeping the brand story unified? Because there are a lot of cooks in the kitchen. We work with a lot of partners, with clients, and it can get a little muddy sometimes. So how were you able to kind of keep everybody sort of in their place and still be able to drive the purpose home?
Lauren
Well, the one thing that really was special about this project is I think everyone really kept the shared goal at the heart of this. Like we were story first. We knew if we were doing something and it didn’t come back to our authentic selves and our story and the history, decades and decades of history here, then it just wasn’t going to be right for this project. On a kind of formal level, I think Brooke and I really worked to ensure that everyone was winning, right? Like we might have all had our own needs in this project, but it’s really important to me that Nike felt like they were winning, that Fanatics was winning, that Class Trip obviously was winning. We wanted our partners at Rhino to feel included, like all of that was really special. And it sort of tethered around this kind of brilliance of the Kesey family and everything that they’ve done for this place. And so, you know, if it didn’t feel like celebration to them, we weren’t going to do it. And everybody just understood that. On a project management level, you know, I use the like the RACI model a lot. So, I’m really looking for like, okay, define who’s responsible, who’s going to be accountable, who needs to be informed, who should we consult with? And that was a lot of work. It certainly escalated, I would say, maybe once we made the announcement, there was a lot more of doing that every day. But there’s a lot of trust. Like Brooke and I have worked together on several projects now, and there’s a lot of trust there. And I knew, like, if she was telling me this is what the project needs, and she’s obviously more of a Deadhead than I am, I sort of said that she was like my pop culture consultant on all things Deadhead. So, we just really looked to like leverage the strengths that each partner was bringing and each person had at the table. And I think that shared goal was really at the heart of it for this project.
Jenn
Yeah, who you work with really makes the difference. It really does.
Kalli
Yeah, I mean, I know having an, even for this podcast, having a nice co-host, it’s all right.
Jenn
Awwww.
Kalli
You’re okay. So just, you know, kind of talking about your partners, this in particular, had some really cool partners that you’re working with here. So, can you share a favorite behind-the-scenes story of something that the fans might not know, but would love to hear?
Brooke
I’m just going to lead with mine because Lauren worked a lot more with some of our licensees and especially with Class Trip. But getting to know the Kesey family was incredible for me. I’ve been here just under two years now. So, it feels like I’ve been working on this project for half of the time I’ve been here. But getting to know them and their story and Eugene was incredible, whether their connection to football with Cheryl’s two sons played here, or Kit, who’s really big in the music scene here, their stories of growing up and getting to go to shows, some of the iconic ones like at the Pyramids, which is one of my, if I could ever be in a different place for one time in history, that’s probably up there. But getting to know them was truly one of the coolest parts of this whole project and just hearing their stories. I grew up not in an area where they played a lot, and so getting to experience that kind of felt like I was part of that.
Lauren
Okay, I have to say ditto on that with Brooke, but I’ll give a different answer that I also love, but just the generosity and the kindness of the Kesey family and just the stories we heard through this process were unbelievable and so much fun. I think for me, the other maybe like full circle moment where it just felt like, oh my gosh, did we just do this, was hearing Elliot Hill, the Nike CEO, when he was talking. They had a tie-dye tailgate on the Nike campus the Thursday before the game, and they invited all of their, I’ll say teammates, that’s important to their culture, on the actual headquarters of the campus to come, to like stop work that day, come to the tailgate, enjoy time together, enjoy the kind of fruits of the labor, if you will, for all the things that were happening to make this project a success. And just hearing like Elliot completely, he’s not scripted, he’s just standing there and talking through like why this mattered so much to them, to us, like the brands and why they’ve been in connection with each other for so long, that was just really special. And it felt like a moment we were all sort of gathered, and the gravity was really felt there of like, oh my goodness; this is really a thing. And just pretty fun to walk on the Nike campus. I’ve been there several times, but it was really nice to see it like all ducked out in, I say ducked out and tie dye with like everywhere. It was just really, really fun. And that team did a fantastic job pulling that event off, and we felt so welcomed to be there. But hearing Elliot was really special for me.
Jenn
Yeah, I’ve worked in the music industry. I’ve worked with a lot of high-profile people. And when the experience is like the one that you had where they’re supportive and they have the same vision as you and they also want this to be a success, it really goes a long way. Unfortunately, not everybody is like that. But I’m so happy to hear that everything just worked out so well for you. It sounds like from the very beginning, and even though you had a little bit of a time crunch, everything was great. I mean, the reception was great. Turnout was wonderful. Do you think, do you see anything happening in the future? Any other, I don’t know, collaborations across other universities? Are we going to maybe see the Grateful Ducks return for another sport? Where do you think that this could go?
Brooke
Yeah, I’ll start with us internally and then kind of with other universities. Our plan is fully that we are currently planning right now for a men’s and a women’s basketball game. So very excited for that. I can say here men’s basketball will be when we play UCLA. So that will be really special with our Bill Walton connection there, as well as, you know, we’re kind of planning for maybe a couple of other events. There’ll be things we can use from the game that we just had, but other stories we can tell too. So, I think it’s a cool way to incorporate our community. I can’t tell you how many Dead cover bands in the state of Oregon reached out to me in this process. We built a lot of really cool relationships there that I think that this can echo not just this year, but maybe in the future as well. Like I said, a lot of other people in my position at other universities have reached out. Some of them just want my notes or what I might be submitting for awards because I think we could win a couple with this. They want to see that to be able to show their athletic directors or their team what’s possible when you’re crossing over a brand outside of sports. We definitely presented the challenge that it is possible to execute. And so, they’re very interested in wanting to do the same, whether it’s with the Dead or with another band.
Kalli
So, speaking of another band, if you could dream up any other crossover, any band or even any brand, who would you want the Ducks to collaborate with next? And that’s a big question because this would be a pretty big follow-up to this campaign. So, take a second to think about it.
Brooke
Oregon doesn’t really do the same thing twice, right? So, it would always look different. My dream one, I’ll let Lauren think about it for a second. My dream one would be Dolly Parton recorded a song called Eugene, Oregon very early in her career. I would absolutely, I play it in the stadium after every win, and I think it would be a really special thing to be able to bring that here, whether it’s for one game or a major crossover, or I think that’s my pie in the sky one.
Jenn
Come on, Dolly. I know you’re listening to this podcast. Come on, make it happen.
Kalli
If Dolly knew my name.
Lauren
Oh my gosh, it’s also just like the sweetest song ever. So just props to Dolly for always being a good writer. Brooke, that’s such a good, you’re so much better at music than me. Like I feel like I have the worst answers, but I’m just gonna say what other people in my life would want me to say, which is my niece would say we need to do something with the K-pop Demon Hunters, right? It doesn’t feel very us. I think, my husband would have some sort of just epic, like legendary, go back to the roots of music, like iconic bands. And so, he’d want that. We have a bunch of fans of K-pop in this office, so they’d want something else. I would want Cher. Like, there’s really no way to recreate what we just did here. So, all of those would be so different. But our fans like to tell us what to do and where to go. And my suspicion is, you know; we’re going to lean into seeing when we can get Dead and Co back here. And that will feel really good to me if we can make that happen. So, yeah.
Kalli
That’s awesome. And those are a lot of really awesome takes. Imagine if like Dolly and Cher came together, like my mind is.
Lauren
Oh my gosh, stop.
Kalli
I think that I would literally just like explode into just a million pieces of glitter.
Jenn
Well, we would have to go see that because I feel like we’d be part of making that happen.
Kalli
Yeah. So, Dolly and Cher just, you know, e-mail imPRessions with those tickets, please.
Lauren
We’re already planning our outfits. Let’s go. Oh my gosh.
Kalli
Yes. Well, the Grateful Ducks campaign really captured the power of blending tradition and creativity, and even, you know, how a football game can become a cultural experience. Thank you both so much for being here today and sharing the vision behind your captivating partnership. We cannot wait to see what’s in store for the future… Cher and Dolly. We want to thank all of our listeners once again for all your continued support, but we are not done yet. Season four is on the horizon and is jam-packed with a powerful guest list you won’t want to miss. So, stay on the lookout for an announcement on our release date through the Pollack Group social channels. And in the meantime, drop us a line at impressions@pollackgroup.com. See you soon.
