Natalí Doreski, the former lioness who founded an esports club

She is a former Leona, she met her partner playing hockey, they became friends playing in the first team of Hacoaj, a club in Tigre, Buenos Aires province. Then their lives took different paths. Over time, they met again and created a revolutionary project: 5 Yards, a sports marketing content producer. Today she is a partner of Diego Schwartzman at Stone Movistar. Natalí studied Business Administration at the UBA, she was a member of the national hockey team for 8 years; and she lived from professional hockey in Spain and the Netherlands.

“How did this Five Yard adventure start?”

—Together with Corina (Bespresvany), also founder of Stone Movistar, we got together because the reality that once you stop doing a high-performance sport, that you no longer play in a national team, which is the maximum objective that one has, is hard the day after. It was a great challenge to know what he could do. I received a degree in business administration. For us athletes it is spectacular to be able to compete, study and I have always tried in life to connect with the things I like, to be positive. I was lucky to be able to reach my best in hockey and when I finished I began to look inside myself for what I liked to do. I was very clear about what I didn’t like. I knew it had to do with marketing, but not traditional.

In 2006 it was founded 5 Yards, a marketing agency and producer of events and activations that reflects not only his passion for sport. 5 yards in hockey is the minimum distance to not commit an infraction, to have good visibility of your own and other players, and of the field of play. It also reminded them how much they enjoyed doing things together. So much so, that the events in their club were developed and carried out by both of them.

“How did you decide on this?”

—Chatting with a publicist friend, he told me why he didn’t do something with sports marketing. When I stopped to think, I realized that in 15 years I had learned a lot of things and I began to try to find my way of seeing that. I associated myself with a friend and we founded 5 yards. From the beginning we knew what we didn’t like, but on the other hand we didn’t really know what we wanted to do. We tried to make an agency project generating content for brands connecting them, design, entertainment, a bit trying to unite the passions that we had and not to go separately. We wonder why a sports project can’t be cool, can’t be entertaining, can’t have design, that’s what we focus on.

The first office they had was lent to them by a friend and they stayed there for a while until the first jobs came out.

Do you choose the clients?

—I have been working for a long time for brands with which I agree in their values, in their way of seeing the market, with their philosophy, with the fact that they try to innovate. What I love about my job is that it always starts with a blank page and from there how we manage to create differential experiences for the consumer, also getting involved with social networks.

—How did your approach to esports come about?

—I am the mother of three boys, that’s when I began to get closer to esports because I consumed them without realizing it. What’s more, at home I am the administrator of the Play. I started to link that with my work, because I realized the way in which these products were consumed and if we don’t put something on the stream, they won’t reach this mass of kids who are avid for these things. We went to a gaming expo and I realized that something strange was happening that was great and immediately through Peque (Diego Schwartzman), Colo (Andrés Schwartzman) we formed an esports club.

—Your partner bought the project right away?

—Corina, she screamed to the sky, she told me “you are crazy, what do we who come from traditional sports have to do with esports”. There came the double challenge of putting together a club where traditional sports were united with esports, and all the philosophy that we learned from traditional sports was taken to electronics. We have had it for three years and we are super happy, because it is a company led by very young boys who permanently put their stamp on it.

—What do esports have in common with traditional sports?

—That they are team games, values ​​are very important, there is a tactic, a technique, a technical director. They have obvious differences because in electronic games physical skill is not essential. It is much more mental, but you have to train, have a routine and set a goal, that is, they have more similarities than differences.

-And your sons?

They enjoy playing games, but esports for them is a way to socialize with their friends. For my children this happens more as a social issue, even, but it does not displace the physicality of the sport they do.

—How do you handle the team?

—An esports organization is not just having a team, it must also have different pillars when it comes to running an organization. The great challenge is multitasking, why you should know about the game, communication and social networks. Due to the training we have, we like to satisfy all those who approach us to do 360 coverage for the client and those who follow us. I use everything I learned in Cinco Yardas for Stone, because I believe that to be successful in this, You have to be very creative and use all the weapons you have at your disposal.

“And the future?”

—We are with a project to leave the country with Stone that absorbs a large amount of our time.

Natalí’s life is a permanent change, a constant transformation that makes her unite her great passions, sports with a specialty that maintains a large part of the principles with which she was educated, but that requires more mind than physical dexterity.

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