Brady, Jeter make headlines at Fanatics Sports Comic Con | Wilnesh News

Since New York Comic Con began in 2006, the show has expanded far beyond comics to become a broad celebration of fans in anime, video games, television, movies and all areas of pop culture, attracting more than 200,000 attendees last year.

Now, Fanatics is looking to do the same thing in sports, hosting a three-day event in New York in August that aims to be a hub for sports fandom, culture and collecting.

Lance Fensterman, CEO of Fanatics Events and former president of ReedPop, said he sees some similarities between pop culture fans and sports fans. However, he noted that while events like New York Comic Con have grown to encompass many different fan bases and communities, the sports-focused event space is “ready for a little disruption.”

“You have collector shows and card shows, thousands of them across the United States, and they’re great for collectors. You also have league- and team-sponsored fan events that are specific to the sport or of the team,” Finsterman said. “What we want to do is combine the best of all those elements, and then culture and entertainment.”

The three-day event, called Fanatics Fest NYC, will be held at New York City’s Javits Center, a large expo center that has hosted New York Comic Con, the New York International Auto Show and other large conferences and events. The event will feature multiple stages and theaters, interactive features and games, merchandise and trading card areas, and a museum display of rare cards and sports memorabilia. Fensterman said Tom Brady, Derek Jeter, Eli and Peyton Manning, Kevin Durant, Sabrina Ionescu and Hulk Hogan are only scheduled to attend some sports stars.

Fensterman said the event will also go beyond sports, integrating entrepreneurs, entertainers and cultural influencers into the show, providing a platform to discuss how sports can be a platform for inspiration. Exclusive apparel collaborations and a variety of unique products will be available from the hundreds of teams and leagues that Fanatics partners with, including nearly every U.S. professional sports entity such as the NFL, NBA, WNBA, MLB, NHL, MLS, UFC and WWE.

“These are moments that we’re excited about, we just don’t see anything like this happening elsewhere in live sports,” Finsterman said.

Fanatics Events, which launched last July in partnership with Endeavor-owned talent management company IMG, held its first large-scale event last week to oversee the WWE Universe at WrestleMania, a five-day festival in Philadelphia with WWE Top events are held simultaneously. According to Fanatics, the festival is the highest-grossing and most-attended fan event in WWE history.

Through this broader sports event, Fanatics Fest NYC will help the Fanatics Events team achieve the same business goal: to enhance Fanatics’ other business verticals and create new business around sports events.

Tickets for the event range from $20 to $400, with adult general admission tickets priced at $50 per day. Fensterman said he aims to attract 50,000 to 100,000 fans for the inaugural event, which could lead to other smaller events around the country. He said the company will also look to host events in international markets to help its alliance partners build fan bases overseas.

These new activities will also help drive the company’s other business lines: its business and merchandise division, collectibles and trading cards business, live shopping business and sports betting division.

Fanatics, a three-time CNBC Disruptor 50 company ranked No. 21 in 2022, has grown beyond the commodity roots of the company founded by Michael Rubin. The company’s meteoric rise has helped it earn a valuation of more than $31 billion and set the stage for a possible IPO. It also puts a magnifying glass on the company’s moves. The company said it was wrongly blamed this spring for issues related to MLB jerseys, and it also found itself in a legal battle with DraftKings over its expansion into sports betting.