A few weeks ago, I went to Sports Pro Live - an exciting day of hearing from the best in the biz about their insights into the biggest sports brand opportunities and challenges right now. Luckily for you, I was listening to every second of it, so here are the four most valuable takeaways you should know about:
1.“We have a sustainability strategy (but you wouldn’t know it).”
Sports storytelling is thriving, thanks to the rise in media content and consumption. But despite this and their global stage, almost every league, team, federation and event seems to be struggling to tell the story of its own sustainability strategy in a way that engages athletes or fans.
SailGP is redefining sailing as a sport that is high-speed, high-tech and uniquely powered by nature - and it has ambitions to be the world’s most sustainable, purpose-driven sports platform. Fiona Morgan, Chief Purpose Office at SailGP explained how they’re doing things a little differently. In a world-first initiative, each team will also be competing in SailGP’s Impact League, a season-long competition that rewards teams for actions that benefit the planet and make sailing more inclusive. By tapping into the natural competitiveness of the athletes at the forefront of the sport, the Impact League aims to inspire fans to make more sustainable choices by showcasing the competing teams’ activities.
SailGP’s new league speaks much louder than any website landing page, and it goes to show how sport’s core values of determination, excellence, teamwork can be used to tell much more powerful sustainability stories.
2.True alignment: the theme of the event?
Arsenal’s Commercial Director, Juliet Slot, and NTT Data’s CTO, Tom Winstanley took the stage together to discuss their technological partnership that aims to transform how they engage their fans. Their talk was underpinned by the ‘Why?’ that forms the foundations of the partnership and captured the power of great strategic alliances. Juliet explained that the partnership has ‘given us the expertise we didn’t have in-house to build a tech stack against the strategy that we have put together’. Talking as a united team, it’s clear that’s how they see the partnership between their brands - as working together towards one common goal.
Similarly, Sarah Massey, Managing Director for the 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup, spoke about how Capgemini’s partnership with Women’s Rugby was a natural extension of Capgemini’s own core values. Capgemini isn’t simply investing financially, they’re actually helping transform the future of the sport too, by coaching the next generation of women in rugby who aspire to be leaders.
Brands have always been excited by the large and enthusiastic audiences that sports partnerships bring. But as both stakeholders and brands start to view sponsorship as part of their supply chain, authentic alignment is now more important - and more valuable - than ever.
3. Buying a team vs. team buy-in.
Since the pandemic, the landscape has transformed for team owners. Fan-owned teams like Brentford still exist, whose owners have shown the heart behind the club with fan-first initiatives like ticket-price-freezes, subsidised travel and cheaper children's tickets to make the sport inclusive for the next generation of fans.
But more and more clubs are being bought by private equity, sovereign wealth funds, and globalised investors, and while that can be a great boost to teams, it also increases the need for financial returns. Culturally, there’s two things that need to happen to make these new eras successful; first, bring everyone (staff, players, fans, stakeholders) on board with the investors and their goals, and second, for the investor to take the time to really understand and appreciate everyone else’s goals too. Ownership today demands alignment internally and a clear plan to win over fans externally.
Private equity’s growing influence in football is reshaping the industry, creating opportunities for financial innovation and operational transformation. But success will depend on balancing profitability with preserving the sport’s cultural and community values.
4. A new era needs a new proposition.
The core message from Michele Kang, Holly Murdoch and Dame Tracey Crouch’s discussion on the £1bn women’s sport opportunity was this: the women’s game needs its own brand and commercial strategy. The women’s game offers greater accessibility and the chance to, as Holly Murdoch, Chief Operating Officer at WPLL put it, ‘inspire a more equitable society through the power of football’.
Yet despite the growing recognition that this game has a different fanbase, media landscape and societal role, many clubs are still relying too heavily on the men’s brand legacy. Compared to the men’s media-driven model, women’s football sees nearly 60% of revenue come through sponsorship deals. This game already plays by different commercial rules - and requires different thinking to secure further investment that will fuel the infrastructure, research, and talent that will define the future of the women’s game.
The newly promoted London City Lionesses are an example of this fresh approach - the first club to play in the WSL without the halo of a men’s team. Michele Kang spoke at SPL about how it’s using the first-of-its-kind youth fan research to establish team loyalty early, and create entertainment-driven match day experiences.
For brands, women’s football represents an opportunity to enter the sports sponsorship space at a lower entry cost, and have a greater impact on engagement. And rightfully, LCL recognises the need to create a new blueprint of how a team looks and acts that stands independently from the men’s game – one that appeals distinctively to those fans and investors.