Friedkin Group show confidence as Everton look for minimum 10-year deal
Everton's owners have reportedly instructed the firm heading the stadium naming rights search to focus on two key points
When it comes to opportunity, there have been few presented to Everton like the new stadium. The Toffees will take residence in their 52,888-seater home at the start of next season.
The stadium has been designed to maximise revenue-generating potential, with a major focus on turning it into a destination to be used throughout the year and not just on matchdays, with the hospitality offerings set to be among some of the best in European football.
A new stadium has coincided with a new dawn at Everton as The Friedkin Group take the wheel to guide the club’s future having completed the takeover of the club from former owner Farhad Moshiri back in December.
Ensuring Premier League safety this season is of paramount importance, and TFG have already had to make one major call after opting to part ways with Sean Dyche and bring in David Moyes for an Everton return. That already looks to have paid dividends with the Toffees nine points above the drop zone with a game in hand.
After so much financial turmoil in recent years that saw Everton hit with two separate points deductions for breaches of the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules for 2021/22 and 2022/23, TFG set about addressing the club’s balance sheet as soon as they stepped through the door, tackling the debt issue that had been growing at the club by settling some and restructuring others.
There is a growing reason for optimism among Evertonians, and as the club looks ahead to a new beginning at a new home, quite what that home will be called remains an unknown.
Back in 2022, Everton partnered with US company Elevate Sports Ventures to aid their own commercial efforts when it came to new partnership sales, as well as helping drive forward the search for a naming rights partner for the new stadium, the piece of sponsorship inventory that will be the most lucrative for the football club.
Elevate has a strong track record when it comes to naming rights. Elevate partnered with the Oak View Group in 2021 on the premium hospitality at Co-Op Live, the new music arena built next to Manchester City's Etihad Stadium campus, a project done in collaboration between Manchester City Council and Manchester City owners City Football Group.
Over the past three years Elevate have delivered stadium naming rights success in the US, landing a 10-year deal for the San Jose Earthquakes MLS side for their home to be known as PayPal Park, while the Pittsburgh Steelers NFL team landed a new stadium naming rights deal over 15 years with financial technology firm Acrisure.
According to a report by SportBusiness on Tuesday, Elevate have been instructed by TFG to prioritise brand alignment when it comes to securing a new stadium naming rights partner, as well as a minimum ten-year contract as they race to find a partner before the start of next season.
The trend in America has for some time been around longer term deals, particularly for new stadiums. The importance of getting it right from a naming rights perspective for a newly-built arena cannot be overstated, from both a value and a brand perspective. Stadiums can become synonymous with brands reasonably quickly, and that can be hard to shake, meaning that the value of the first deal is often higher than a renaming due to the fact that such things are factored in and that the ability to cut through may have been impacted.
Tottenham Hotspur have yet to acquire a name for their £1bn stadium that was opened in 2019, with chairman Daniel Levy not satisfied with the valuation of partnerships that had been presented, even stating that just keeping the name of the football club in the stadium name might be more impactful from a marketing point of view.
At the start of the 2021/22 campaign, Brighton & Hove Albion started the extension to their stadium naming rights deal with American Express, the AMEX Stadium rights paying a reported £100m over the decade. That deal also includes shirt sponsorship.
Given the strength of those rights, albeit including front of shirt sponsorship, which may be a consideration to align at some stage, and the fact that deal was done during a Covid-impacted season, it would be fair to assume that the market would have jumped in the last four years and that Everton could get greater value for a bigger venue, at an iconic location, which has the potential to host major events such music concerts.
Everton are in a strong position, and in seeking a minimum 10-year deal it demonstrates the confidence that TFG has in securing what it believes to be a good deal in the current market.