11 minute read
We Are Nations
Patrick Mahoney We Are Nations
The emergence of esports in pop culture
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AUTHOR Adam Fitch @byadamfitch
sports and gaming are converging with other entertainment and leisure sectors and, slowly but surely, they’re making their way into pop culture. From in-game concerts performed by popular DJs to celebrities investing in esports organisations, the lines are blurring more and more as time goes on. E
To discuss this interesting intersection of entertainment, we sat down with Patrick Mahoney, CEO of We Are Nations. With past experience in the music industry and now clothing a healthy portion of those in esports, he’s in a great position to observe this happening. The Esports Journal: You have a lot of experience in the music industry. What do you make of the crossover between music and esports, and why do you think this crossover is occurring? Patrick Mahoney: For the same reasons there was a connection between action sports and music in the 1990’s, everyone who is participating in the esports ecosystem wants to put their mark on the entirety of the culture. The classic 1990’s example, of course, is The Vans Warped Tour. At the time, for those first few years, it might as well have been a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, because it worked so well.
ESJ: What do you make of the musical performance seen at esports events? A lot of people aren’t overly keen! PM: It’s funny that people aren’t overly keen from the esports side because I can assure you that the Marshmello and Fortnite collaboration has got the entire music business scrambling. Maybe that’s the point – clearly the esports community wants to consume music, but apparently on its own terms. We’ll have to watch.
I have no doubt that over time, ‘halftime’ shows will prevail at major esports events and the Coldplay’s, Justin Timberlake’s, and Maroon 5’s of the times will be taking part, posting some of their best engagement numbers of the year.
ESJ: These days, organisations and companies are trying to create clothing that can be worn anywhere without it being overtly obvious what the brand’s origin actually is. What are your thoughts on the emerging trend of esports apparel being completely unrelated to gaming and esports? PM: Endemic esports brands are definitely a piece of the overall pie. I’ve invested in a few lifestyle brands over my career and they definitely serve the purpose of leading the way in terms of trend and product. But it’s so hard to cut through and I think most of these brands will hit a wall once they exhaust their internal resources. Some will be able to scale, some won’t, and some won’t want to. That’s how it’s always worked. In 10 years, it will be surf/skate/ snow all over again, but with gaming.
ESJ: In the past year, we’ve seen major players in clothing and sportswear enter esports. Why do you think they’ve decided to get involved at this point? PM: I honestly don’t think they have, really. Most of the activations we’ve seen thus far have been from the local management level, and in most cases, they’ve been limited. Don’t get me wrong, there is some great stuff going on out there with Champion and some other brands, but they should be seen as pieces of an overall merchandise strategy. An activation – a real brand statement – is like when Jordan and Nike launched with Paris Saint-Germain this past year. Everybody knew this was coming and when it came out it blew up in the sports world.
That’s not happening yet in esports. The scale is simply not yet there. And to take the Jordan and PSG example further, that deal literally revitalized a brand and created a market that opened up further opportunities for additional product categories. Have you seen the Herschel and PSG backpacks? They are amazing. I don’t want to negotiate against myself here, but the industry needs to learn that exclusive deals aren’t always the best deals.
All this said, we’ve had numerous discussions with brands about how we can help with scale, so I think you’ll see us continue to partner up and execute on behalf of brands. It’s important to point out that We Are Nations as a mark is more or less neutral – we are building the company to be synonymous with esports merchandise quality and not as a specific brand on its own.
ESJ: Do you think it’s necessary for esports to tie itself with pop culture for its growth in the future? PM: Yes. My 13-year-old son spends a lot of his free time gaming, listening to Spotify, and watching YouTube videos all at the same time. There’s simply so much out there, all cross-referenced and cross-delivered. That said, I expect esports to become a dominant part of pop culture so the balance of power may very well shift.
ESJ: How do you see the industry playing into pop culture in the next few years? PM: Like I said above, the concept of who is leveraging who should flip pretty quickly. Traditional sports lead the narrative on pop culture, and have for a long time. Expect the same here.
ESJ: More and more, we’re seeing celebrities investing in esports. Do you think this helps the scene, hinders it, or neither? PM: I definitely think celebrity investment can help give certain organizations an improved brand voice. That said, these organizations are businesses first and brand voice is only half the battle. The teams and other companies that rise to the top of the pile in the next few years will be creatively executed enterprises with excellent business fundamentals.
ESJ: Besides talking on the pop culture panel at ESI London, what are you most looking forward to at the event? PM: Meeting new people. We are at a stage in the industry where these conferences and other events are literally filled to the roof with awesome ideas, but I also love London so I’m coming a few days early. I’ll be bringing a bike and will spend the weekend riding in Surrey, which has been calling me since the London 2012 road race (if anyone wants to ride…). I also need a new pair of kicks and the Adidas Originals shop off Regent Street is a favorite.
DAIMANI
Turning the hospitality pain into a gain
AUTHOR Kit Walker
ax Müller knows a thing or two about VIP hospitality after working at the heart of the four previous FIFA World Cup hospitality programmes, including the 2006 tournament hosted in his native Germany. M
After ending his involvement with the FIFA World Cup last year, Müller has co-founded digital sales platform DAIMANI. For Müller and his DAIMANI colleagues esports is the next biggest and most exciting commercial hospitality opportunity, and this in an industry estimated to be turning over €6 billion a year.
Max Müller
“I know many esports organisers see hospitality more as a burden, a contractual obligation to their stakeholders, not a very pleasant one at that and certainly not a revenue stream in its own right,” said Müller. “But that will change in esports just as it has done everywhere in the live event industry, and we can help rights-holders embrace that opportunity and deliver the full commercial potential.”
Müller’s contention is that organisers of esports tournaments will run into the same inescapable pressures around ticket pricing as those faced by rights holders in conventional sports. “Supply and demand theory tells you how tickets should be priced. But in the real world, where events only succeed with a high-level of fan engagement, that’s not practical or even desirable,” says Müller. “An economist would recognise the irony: the bigger and better you want to make your event, the more you need fans to validate that experience which is the key to your broadcast and sponsorship proposition. But that means the less ability you have to price tickets according to supply and demand.”
He points out that even the main FIFA, UEFA and International Olympic Committee events rarely lift facevalue tickets by more than seven or eight percent over a four-year cycle – effectively below inflation.
The answer lies in the introduction of premium or VIP ticketing, says Müller, which gives organisers the ability to taken in hand a percentage of the venue’s inventory and dramatically increase the yield per seat through the provision of quality food and beverage and other unique live event experiences. Esports organisers could really profit from a keen eye like Müller’s, and someone whose business instincts are always to take the long view.
“The first modern FIFA World Cup in terms of commercial hospitality is recognised as being 2006 – before that the arrangements were very ‘ad hoc’ and decentralised’’ says Müller. FIFA’s four-year to financial report to 2018 shows FIFA’s net income from VIP hospitality was USD184 million including a USD61million profitshare from Müller’s former employer.
Müller’s breadth of knowledge and the quiet intensity with which he explains how the mismatch between ticketing supply and demand feeds into the commercial hospitality opportunity, should be enough to make even the most fatigued gaming executive realise that the industry better get ready for an esports hospitality revolution.
DAIMANI are so certain about the prospects esports hospitality poses, the company even offers a hospitality product-development consultancy as part of its selling proposition, to help overstretched organisers realise the full potential of their events earningpower. This covers catering, project management, hostesses, access passes, and guest management skills. “It might feel to a lot of people that VIP hospitality is a recent phenomenon, therefore everyone’s a little unready and not sure what to do and where to look,” explains Müller. “But as far back as the days of the Colosseum, those who wanted the best of the best were able to purchase the equivalent of ringside seats and were treated to an early form of sports hospitality in the form of well-groomed service people carrying plates of cakes, pastries, dates and other sweetmeats, and generous cups of wine.”
With esports continuing to grow in terms of event attendance and sponsorship, the next key area of revenue for these tournament organisers will be hospitality. This is where companies like DAIMANI can step forward, and add true value to the industry, for attendees and organisers alike.
“VIP hospitality goes to something in the core of our being, about who we are as humans, and our desire to feel alive by embracing that live-event experience,” said the Zurich-based CEO, whose DAIMANI platform launches on
October 1st and will be the first global marketplace for sports, music, and cultural event VIP hospitality packages. Developed in partnership with SAP, who are so delighted with the association that the software company has invested extensively in media spend to promote DAIMANI, the platform is already available in seven languages: English, German, French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, and Chinese, and can price purchases live in more than 70 currencies with almost 40 different payment methods, reflecting the surging global appetite for customer convenience.
Within DAIMANI, the responsibility for signing up the hospitality sales rights of event organisers, or ‘onboarding’ them to the digital sales platform, is with the Hamburg-based, former Lagardere director Tobias Knüwe.
“The response has been very encouraging, especially from those companies who can make the link in their minds: official hospitality is really an extension of the esports experience... if you’re serious about the game, you have to be serious about your VIP experience,” said Knüwe.
Knüwe says DAIMANI - which also has offices in Paris, Hamburg, London, Amsterdam, Moscow, Cape Town, Hong Kong, Sochi, and Sao Paulo - hopes to be able to announce a series of sales partnerships in the near term, with companies keen to take advantage of the October 1st launch of the platform’s easy and intuitive-to-use SAPengineered technology.
If you’re reading this and want to know more about DAIMANI, by all means visit their website: www.DAIMANI.com
Tobias Knüwe
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