A Conversation About the Tallest Main End Zone Display in Football at the Denver Broncos

It’s 72 feet tall. It’s the tallest main end zone display in professional football. And it’s located at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver, Colorado. The Broncos are entertaining their fans and audiences with a massive new video board in 2023. So, naturally, we visited the city next to the Rocky Mountains to hear about their new technology.

The following is an excerpt from the Daktronics Experience Podcast with Senior Vice President of IT Russ Trainor and Chief Marketing Officer Hailey Sullivan.

Justin Ochsner

What was it like from an IT perspective to get all of this new technology installed and ready for your first preseason game?

Russ Trainor

So, let’s jump back in time a little bit to late last summer and through the fall. We did a big upgrade with Daktronics in 2013, but also did our due diligence for this year’s $100 million uplift to this place. You want to make sure you pick the right product, so even back then, we were going through and meeting with all the vendors asking, “What’s going to work?” But honestly, you guys had great support for the past 10 years, so that part was kind of on our brain and knowing the support side was good. So kudos on that part!

Then we looked at all the different tech and it was at that point we knew we were going to go with Daktronics. This is what we want, but we didn’t know ALL of what we wanted at that point. We looked at our club spaces and older projection screens. We wanted bigger screens there and we wanted brighter screens. And then we started walking around the stadium thinking of where we can fit something here and can we swap something out there. So, it kind of blossomed along the way.

We didn’t want to have to go back next year and say, “We didn’t do this.” Or say, “We only upgraded this club but didn’t do the other three.” So, we collaborated with ownership and our CFO and came to the same page of a vision for the stadium.

Fast forward a couple of months and we ordered the gear and it arrived on time. The construction started right after the season ended and it was go time. There was a little bit of worry with lead times, but you guys comforted us there. It worries you in the background because in the venue, they want everything turned on by the first preseason game. Well, we’re here now and everything’s installed and turned on.

Matt Anderson

Right, and I’ll throw it over to you Hailey. You came in back in January and there was obviously still stuff being torn down and construction going on. Were you sort of looking at the conceptual image to get an idea of what you’re going to get to work with?

Hailey Sullivan

Yes, it was more like we were waiting for everything to get set up. Our team didn’t have access to the control room yet to actually test anything out, so we were playing around thinking, “We think this is what this will look like in a render.” And it wasn’t until just a few short weeks ago that we started seeing it live and testing it.

We just released a launch video of the scoreboard two days ago and it’s been amazing. It’s a drag race because as soon as everything opened up, we moved and immediately started testing. The team has been working around the clock to make sure we are game day ready so we’re ready to flip the switch and everything turns on.

Russ Trainor

Yeah, you always have that moment when you’re like, “It’s on, right? Yes. Okay, it’s working right.” It might need some optimization and those kinds of things after first being turned on, right. But that’s where you guys help us out and we’re ready to go. But it’s still alive and heartbeats pumping.

Matt Anderson

We also heard about the conceptualizing when going through game looks and you had content on a laptop but were thinking about how it will actually look on the display once it’s fired up. Sometimes you don’t get to finalize the look until you actually see it on the display.

Justin Ochsner

And once you have everything on the board, did your mind start racing toward certain sponsorships or certain content ideas you want to try?

Hailey Sullivan

All of the above! Once we finally saw the board, the first reaction was, “It’s big. It’s really, really big.” Which is great. It was more, “Okay, now what can we do with this real estate? What can we do from a full swipe right for that graphics package to get the fans on their feet? What are the ways to use this type of real estate? How can we elevate our partners in a different way?” So there’s a lot of creative juices flowing right now. What else can we deliver?

First, we want to make sure we are inspiring our football team. So, how do we use the space on game day tomorrow for all the right uses that they need to help them secure that W? But then there’s so many other things we can do with it and that even goes beyond game day. This is Empower Field at Mile High. It’s a destination. How does this become a differentiating factor? It’s a competitive advantage for events, concerts, all sorts of things. So, there are a lot of things to think about. I feel like we’re only scratching the surface.

To hear the rest of this conversation, head on over to the Daktronics Experience Podcast episode #171 or follow this link to view the on-site podcast on YouTube.