Menominee tribe buys naming rights for Wisconsin Herd arena in Oshkosh

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The Menominee tribe has purchased the naming rights for the Wisconsin Herd arena in Oshkosh, the minor league affiliate of the Milwaukee Bucks.

The purchase will help the tribe promote its casino in Keshena, and its lumber mill in nearby Neopit, said Gary Besaw, Menominee tribal chairman.

"We also thought this would be a great opportunity for us to provide insight and information as to who the Menominee people are," he said in an interview. "This is a great source of pride for us."

Terms of the five-year sponsorship were not released.

The $21 million, 3,600-seat arena is being constructed on the south side of Oshkosh and is set to be opened in time for the team's first home game Nov. 17. The city is expected to spend about $4.8 million in infrastructure improvements in connection with the arena project.

The new arena will be called the Menominee Nation Arena and feature the thunderbird, an important part of the tribe's history. In addition to basketball games, the building will be available for concerts, conventions and other gatherings.

The Herd is the G League, or development league, expansion team for the Bucks. The arena is the first constructed for a G League team, the Bucks say.

“Visitors to Menominee Nation Arena will experience the same first-class treatment provided at Menominee Casino Resort and the hospitality synonymous with the Menominee Tribe," Greg Pierce, president of Fox Valley Pro Basketball, said in a statement.

The naming rights present a powerful marketing opportunity in the Fox Valley, with a population of about 400,000 people, Besaw said.

The Menominee reservation and casino are about 70 miles north of Oshkosh. In between lies the Oneida tribe's casino and hotel, just west of Green Bay, and the Menominee want to remind Fox Valley residents that there's another gaming option nearby.

"That's part of the strategy," he said. "To be able to market and brand through what we believe is a winning proposition is a no-brainer."

The partnership also gives the tribe an opportunity to improve "health and wellness initiatives," with help from Herd players and personnel, Besaw said.

"Their people are models for fitness and health" and could work with tribal members with camps or other such efforts, he said.

The Menominee tribe has about 9,000 members, and about 4,000 live on the reservation.

Work is progressing on the $21 million, 3,600-seat Wisconsin Herd arena being constructed on the south side of Oshkosh.

The chairman said the naming rights talks came after the Bucks initially approached Menominee Tribal Enterprises, the lumber business that, among other things, provides the wood for basketball floors, including those used by the Bucks and the NCAA Final Four games.

The sponsorship wound up being a good opportunity for the lumber operations, the casino "and our nation as a whole," Besaw said.

Wood from the Menominee mill will be used for the floor at the new arena, said Hal Koller, owner of Prostar Services Inc., the Bucks' flooring contractor.

Earlier this month, the Herd announced BMO Harris Bank as the team's first major partner. Herd uniforms will include a BMO patch.

The Menominee note that their history reaches back 12,000 years, and the tribe's region extended from what's now Chicago, north along the eastern part of Wisconsin to Upper Michigan.

"We don't have a 'migration story' like other tribes," Besaw said.

"Even the name 'Wisconsin' comes from a Menominee word, which means 'a good place to live,' " Besaw said.

That large geographic footprint allowed the tribe to pursue a massive $800 million casino project at the former Dairyland Greyhound Park. That quest ended in 2015 when Gov. Scott Walker rejected the plan.

Besaw said there were no new casino plans in the works.

"Right now, our current focus is on the success of the Menominee Nation Arena," he said, adding: "The tribe will never not look for opportunities to improve our standard of living."

The Herd season opens Nov. 6 with a road game against the Rio Grande Valley Vipers.