Licensing and sports go together incredibly well. Check out our previous post on how well sports licensing continues to perform. Teams and leagues have decades of built up fandoms and support, through wins and losses. When it comes to individual sports stars though the fans can be more fickle and managing an individual’s reputation can be a lot trickier than that of a team or league.
Sports stars, at the end of the day, are people and people are fallible. Look at the likes of Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods, Mike Tyson, Lamar Odom and Oscar Pistorius. These falls from grace though are pretty rare considering the number of professional athletes there are. A more pressing concern for most athletes is how to break through, become a well known name and then build brand values around your name and image that you can then monetise for the long term. Sports careers don’t last forever and building a brand that can deliver an income to first supplement and then replace the salary of a professional athlete is incredibly savvy.
Licensing used to be pretty rare for individual sports stars, with sponsorships and endorsements being the usual and easiest route for them to monetise their name. However many stars, and their agencies, have learnt the benefits to licensing versus that more traditional route.
It’s incredibly important that athletes own their personal brand and intellectual property if they want to establish long-term brand equity and creative autonomy that they can then use to negotiate licensing deals.
In sponsorships the partnering company typically negotiates control over the athlete's image, name, or other personal brand elements for the duration of the agreement. This means the athlete likely has less control over how their brand is used, and the company can then use their image for a range of marketing purposes without necessarily needing additional approval.
With endorsements and sponsorships the athlete is also usually paid a fixed fee regardless of how the sales of the products perform. On one hand this is less risky for the athlete as they are guaranteed a certain income irrespective of the product's success. However they then don’t share in any of the additional revenue generated through the association.
Endorsements can be strategic for the companies looking to partner with a sports star, but they are most likely focused on short-term gains and specific marketing campaigns for individual product launches. They also often come with exclusivity clauses which then limit the athletes from engaging with other brands in the same space.
Licensing, on the other hand, allows athletes to maintain control of their IP, develop their own brand values and seek to work in whatever categories they want to. All of this though does require the athlete to invest in developing their brand up front, including a logo, key art and clear values based around the athlete’s personality.
David Beckham is a great case study of an athlete building brand equity and creating a lucrative licensing program alongside ongoing endorsement deals. According to Forbes David Beckham secured $36 million through licensing his name across a diverse range of brands in 2024. These included household names like Adidas, Nespresso, and Stella Artois but also the Safilo Group, the Italian eyewear giant. The Salifo Group has entered a perpetual license agreement with Authentic Brands Group for David Beckham Eyewear, replacing the previous contract which was set to expire in 2030. In return for Safilo retaining control over the entire value chain, from design to global distribution, David Beckham will lead the creative direction and collect a nice royalty for each pair sold.
Beckham was very savvy, using sponsorships and endorsements whilst still playing professionally to help build his brand values and equity in certain product categories. He starred in the 2008 Emporio Armani underwear campaign, netting himself a reported $54m over 3 years. His credibility built in the underwear category Beckham then went on to launch a licensed bodywear range with global retailer H&M in 2012, with a Guy Ritchie directed advert. As a licensed deal Beckham would have shared in the success of the products, which likely sold much higher volumes than the Armani ranges. Beckham's equity in this space continues to this day with his multiyear deal with Boss, including for the Boss One Bodywear collection. It will be the first true underwear campaign for the German apparel brand.
Beckham has used his recent Netflix documentary series to build his brand further, and off the back of showing off his outdoor cooking set up, he signed a deal to be a global ambassador of Ninja’s range of cooking and outdoor products. Again showing the importance of building relevancy in product categories that brands then want to work with you on - whether they are licensed or endorsement deals.
Other recent deals that straddle sponsorships and licensing include Roger Federer and Uniqlo, Cristiano Ronaldo and Nike, using his CR7 brand, and Steph Curry and Under Armour.
For brands and manufacturers working with athletes, on licensed or endorsement terms, they are able to leverage the fandom and values of the chosen athletes to help drive sales of their products across a wide range of categories. In doing so they can build long term relationships that serve both sides well. For athletes, as well as revenue, these deals can help build their profiles and lead onto more collaborations.