Inside the NFL’s International Expansion Plans
The league is ramping up its roadmap for worldwide coverage
Posted On: October 1, 2024 By :It was during last season that the National Football League played its 50th regular-season game outside of the United States, 18 years after its first.
It will certainly not take that long to get the next 50 under its belt. The league’s opening weekend featured a game in Sao Paulo, Brazil, as the Philadelphia Eagles outlasted the Green Bay Packers. Sunday’s schedule of games starts with the New York Jets playing the Minnesota Vikings in London, the start of three consecutive games in Europe with a fourth to come in November.
Up until this year, the NFL had capped international games at four per season. Now, starting in 2025, the league has doubled its inventory to eight per year. Which means fans in America better get used to those early morning kickoffs.
“It starts with a really massive fan base globally,” said Matt Shapiro, vice president, NFL global event and marketing strategy. “We have over 165 million fans across eight of the markets that we look at and no doubt broader than that overall. We’re in nearly 200 countries with 80 media partners, 25 different languages and we know that there is an appetite for the NFL globally.”
Success Across the Pond
Of those 25 different languages, the most important one is the language of economics. The league’s rapid expansion across Europe and now into South America is about making more money than ever before.
But it takes money to make money and the NFL has put capital into building its brand around the world. The biggest flag the league has planted is in London, which has hosted 36 of the 51 international games since 2007.
“Part of the great success we’ve seen in London is a little bit of the chicken and egg,” said Henry Hodgson, general manager at NFL UK and Ireland. “The consistency of coming back to the market and continuing to serve and grow the fan base with games are the reasons for the success in the market. We have also made sure that the games aren’t the only piece of what we’re doing in the market. The games are the most visible piece, but our partnerships — both commercially and with media partners — in the market are incredibly important and have helped us develop the sport itself.”
The NFL’s success has emboldened it to expand into other countries and continents.
“Of the five clubs that are playing in the UK this year, four of those five clubs are part of our global markets program,” Hodgson said. “So more than ever, we have teams that are really incentivized to activate themselves in the market around the games. That, in turn, helps the NFL promote 365 days a year rather than just the three days that the teams are active and playing there.”
Whether at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium or at Wembley Stadium, the crowds are always large and loud in London, which has seen a total attendance of nearly three million people in the 36 games played. That’s an average of about 83,000 fans for each game.
Will London Be Super?
With the staggering attendance and economic impact London has demonstrated, it’s only natural for there to be murmurs around the industry for the city to either host a Super Bowl or be awarded a permanent expansion team.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan expressed his desire for the Super Bowl to come earlier this year, saying, “The Super Bowl is really important for us. We have a number of American football games and I want it to come here because we want American sports fans in Europe to come to London to watch them, not just go to America.”
The general theme both Hodgson and Shapiro put forth is while both of those things are in play at some point, neither is imminent.
“Right now we’re focused on making these regular season international games mini Super Bowls,” Shapiro said. “We want them to feel bigger than other regular season games. I think you see a higher level of production around those games, fan events, halftime shows, seeing celebrities and influencers at those games.
“I would not say never, but I think right now we are focused on expanding the number of regular season games and making those all have that Super Bowl feel, which comes with all the excitement and the pomp and circumstance.”
Hodgson added the sentiment from the players and fans who travel from the U.S. to London for a game is it feels like a playoff or Super Bowl atmosphere.
“We pride ourselves in creating sporting experiences that are as close to the Super Bowl as you can get in the UK,” Hodgson said. “But there isn’t a precedent for the NFL to play a Super Bowl in a market that doesn’t already have an NFL franchise in it. So that would be an entirely new thing.
“And I do think the Super Bowl is very entwined with Americana and the American culture, which is part of the reason that NFL fans in the UK and all around the globe love the NFL, and especially love the Super Bowl. Taking it out of the U.S. may lose some of the thing that makes it such a special event.”
Expansion Team Time?
The most prevalent rumor surrounding the NFL and London is that the Jacksonville Jaguars — which will play their 12th and 13th games in the city this season — were being groomed to relocate to London. However, this summer the Jacksonville City Council approved a deal with the Jaguars on a $1.4 billion renovation of EverBank Stadium, keeping the team for at least the next 30 years.
That makes the next question whether or not London will receive an expansion team.
“What I always say is that all we can do is create the best situation if it were to arise for an NFL franchise to relocate to or be awarded to London, but we don’t really have any control over that process,” Hodgson said. “I do believe that we have a fan base sufficient to support an NFL franchise in London. When it comes to the stadium, clearly with Tottenham Hotspur we have a fantastic partner that have worked with us to build a great NFL stadium.”
“I certainly think there could be fan support — we’ve seen that year over year at both the Tottenham games and Wembley,” added Shapiro. “It’s clearly a really passionate and highly knowledgeable and educated fan base. So I don’t think fan support would be a concern. You’ve heard people in our office, whether it’s the commissioner or others, talk about some significant logistics that you’d have to consider if that were to become a reality, whether that’s on the competitive football side or otherwise.”
Hodgson points out for that to become a reality, it would take support from the local government, which the NFL has in London.
“The mayor of London is an example of the support that we have both in the city and across the UK,” Hodgson said. “So all those pieces are in place that if a franchise were to say, ‘we’d like to move to London,’ I think we could support the franchise in London, but it’s not something that’s imminent at the moment.”
The Next NFL Frontier
The Eagles-Packers game at Corinthians Arena in Sao Paulo marked the sixth different city and second continent for an international NFL regular season game.
The NFL hosted its first Germany game in 2022, then added two more in the country last season. This season, the Carolina Panthers will play the New York Giants in Munich at Allianz Arena, home of Bayern Munich, on November 10.
The league also will play its first-ever regular season game in Madrid in 2025 at the Santiago Bernabéu, home to Real Madrid.
“Spain is clearly an exciting opportunity for a number of reasons,” Shapiro said. “The market overall, where we have a strong and healthy fan base, and the partnership with Real Madrid is a pretty unique opportunity to bring the NFL and Real together. Their stadium is right in downtown Madrid, recently renovated and one of the greatest stadiums in the world.”
With the NFL expanding to eight possible international games per season, new cities will need to emerge to fill those slots. So what and where is next?
Shapiro says there’s almost no region in the world that wouldn’t be under consideration. The NFL has a strategic roadmap and a big piece of that is building roots in communities.
“With Brazil, you’ve seen some pretty strong commitment there,” Shapiro said. “We’re opening our first office there. Now we have a general manager in place. We certainly know that Brazil is a place where we want to have a long-term impact. We’ve now played in South America and you’ve heard us talk about the potential for a future game in Australia. Those are things that we’re focused on and we’re going to continue to do the work on.”
The NFL has started several initiatives in Africa, including the NFL Africa program to identify talent on the continent as well as NFL Flag clinics to grow the youth participation. The league has played 11 exhibition games in Japan dating to 1991 and with a large fanbase in Asia, one would think a regular season game there is not too far off as well.
While expansion is rapid, the NFL is particular about the international locations it travels to, using a set of metrics that includes number of fans, fan engagement on social media and whether the necessary infrastructure is available.
“It’s also more than just about games,” Shapiro said. “Yes, games going to places is a massive splash and a massive impact and, in many ways, can help spark a market, but we’re not going to play a game in every single country in the world. We have fans around the world, both of specific teams and players, as well as the league overall. So it’s really just about reaching those fans and making sure that the game can be accessible to them.”
Still, there will be growing pains. The NFL received negative media attention in Brazil when players publicly said they were told to stay in their hotel rooms for safety concerns and not bring family members to the game. The playing surface in Sao Paulo also had issues. But Shapiro says the league takes all the reports seriously.
“If you read some of the feedback after the fact in terms of the city of Sao Paulo it may have been a little bit of a different tone from the players and teams,” he said. “Our first time on a new continent brings with it a number of learnings that we would anticipate we’ll do better into the future. I think broadly speaking, it was a massive success.”
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