Pioneering multi-club ownership group Mercury/13 and Fanatics Collectibles combined to host a unique black-tie event in the middle of a pitch for the UWCL weekend in Lisbon. The event, which gathered global trailblazers, legendary athletes, and visionary investors to celebrate and accelerate the rise of women’s football, served as a snapshot of how new players continue to jump on the train of growing the women’s game.
On the eve of the Women's Champions League final in Lisbon at the end of May, multi-club ownership group Mercury/13 added another chapter to their freeingly unapologetic and imaginative approach to growing the future of women's football. In a new partnership with global trading card brand Fanatics Collectibles, Mercury/13 hosted a black-tie event in the middle of the pitch of the historical Estádio Pina Manique in the Portuguese capital. In a transparent tent, set up in the center circle and laced with strings of light bulbs, female athletes and entrepreneurs, UEFA representatives, Nike, PlayStation and Common Goal leaders, Mercury/13 investors and former professional footballers Lauren Holiday and Eniola Oluko and former England national Jill Scott came together to celebrate and accelerate the rise of women's football. Putting female creatives front and centre of the event, a female choir sang in the dinner, while Marlene Vieira, recipient of a Michelin star earlier this year as the first female Portuguese chef in 30 years, provided the four-course meal. Portugal’s premier family-owned winery SoGrape was in charge of the wine-pairing.
The symbolism of the evening was two-fold: It cemented that Mercury/13, who came blasting on the scene in 2023, pledging to invest £85.5m in women's football teams in Europe and South America, acquiring Italian Serie A club FC Como Women as their first in 2024, are carving out a unique space for themselves as a global power engine in growing the women’s game. Not afraid to go big, to innovate, or to add a whiff of luxury to the, as of yet, rarely luxurious world of women’s football. (For reference, the value of the men’s Champions League tournament stands at an estimated £2.7b, the women’s so far at £37,7m for the 25/26 season.)
And, the varied guest list felt like a microcosmos of not only Mercury/13s unique approach to growing the women’s game, but of the uniqueness of the women’s football space in general: An open and constantly evolving space where power structures are renegotiated and power redistributed, inviting in anyone with a passion for growing the game, whether you’re a small entrepreneur with 700 followers on Instagram or the big time CEO in charge of million-dollar-budgets. It’s a space that, so far, primarily seems defined by its collaborative and experimental nature. Like someone coming up with a new knitting technique for a sweater. You still use yarn, but you might mix expensive merino yarn with beautiful scraps, and maybe add beads. Each element exists and contributes in its own right, rejecting total merino domination while something intricate and unexpected is created that rewires your cognitive framework. Can you do that?
"We wanted to ensure there was a diversity of voices present in the room,” says Victoire Cogevina Reynal, co-founder and co-CEO of Mercury/13 about the event. “We wanted stakeholders and people from across the ecosystem making important decisions for the future of this sport to get together in a context that wasn't a conference. The event was meant to be celebratory. Every person in that room is helping us build this future, because growing women's football doesn't come for free. Everyone, from the athletes on the pitch, to the coaching staff, and all the people behind the scenes, are all working very hard.”
On why Mercury/13 chose to host a black tie event on a pitch, Reynal says: “Part of the DNA of Mercury/13 is that we like to be unexpected and create extraordinary moments so that people fall in love with women's football the way we are. And this event was an execution of that vision.” A recent example of this risk-taking approach was when F.C. Como Women defender Alia Guagni, for her retirement match, sported her CV on the front of her jersey, highlighting the difficulties female players often face when seeking a job after their footballing career is over. The initiative garnered worldwide attention.
“We believe that there is a very new audience coming into the game that might not want to experience football the way it has been experienced before. And I think having an imagination and taking risks will pay off in the long run. Growth in the women’s game is only sustainable if there are fans. And this is our way of building audiences, doing something that catches people’s attention and makes them think, ‘that’s football?’”
With Mercury/13s growing presence in women’s football, it makes sense that they were also present in Lisbon: “We knew that this edition of the Women's Champions League was going to be the biggest one yet. It was going to break world records, the broadcasting rights were going to get renewed. It is a big moment for European women's football, and we wanted to find a way to honour the moment and do it with a Mercury/13 signature look".
The way women’s football weaved itself into the fabric of Lisbon during the UWCL weekend serves as stellar proof of the explosive growth Reynal is referring to. No less than 38,356 spectators showed up for the final between Arsenal F.C. and F.C. Barcelona at Sporting CPs iconic home ground Estádio José Alvalade, making it the third most attended final in the history of the UWCL. Sponsors Lay’s and parent company PepsiCo had pulled out all the marketing stops, hosting events and draping the whole of the city in yellow and blue billboards, posters, and pennants promoting the final, while a fan zone took over Praca do Comercio in the middle of the city on Friday.
Estoril, the beautiful town by the water a short train ride from Lisbon, hosted the inaugural World Sevens Football tournament for 8 women’s clubs teams, Bayern Münich ultimately taking home the lion’s share of the historic 5 million dollar prize pool. Throughout the weekend, more ponytails than usual seemed to flow through the streets of Lisbon, which were also dotted with people of all ages and genders sporting a variety of Arsenal and Barcelona jerseys with names like “Blackstenius”, who scored the winning and only goal in the final, and “Aitana” on the back. On the day of the final, UEFA hosted the event ‘The Business Case for Women's Football’, which highlighted that, since 2021, clubs in the four top women's leagues have experienced a 187% increase in matchday and merchandise revenue.
And for the renewed broadcasting rights? Global streaming platform Disney+ recently secured the rights for the Women's Champions League from the next season and five years on, making the tournament available for their 150 million subscribers worldwide. That is approximately 7 times more subscribers than DAZN, who have broadcast the Women's Champions League for four seasons.
That’s another thing that Mercury/13 is bringing to the table: Like the tent on the pitch, they are completely transparent about how they approach women’s football as a unique business opportunity. But with purpose. Through innovative partnerships with primarily female-owned or -led brands and businesses passionate about pushing for change on and off the pitch, the group aims at changing the face of women’s football through commercialisation, unlocking new investment and expanding global sponsorships. And more big brands, besides the likes of Nike, are coming on board. Most recently, Mercury/13 entered into a strategic partnership with the global sports, music, and entertainment company Wasserman and its women-focused advisory business Wasserman Collective. And Fanatics Collectibles, the global licensee, producer, designer and seller of physical and digital trading cards and sports memorabilia, and since 2022 the owner of the trading card titan Topps, also saw a unique opportunity in co-hosting the black-tie event with Mercury/13.
"The objective for me, for the partnership and the event was for all of us to get together and commit to doing more to advocate for women's sports and grow the business of the sports. And I do like what Mercury/13 is doing, elevating the narrative of women's sports and also curating a different type of experience," says Julie Yoo, Senior Vice President of Global Expansion at Fanatics. Trading cards is a huge business globally. Fanatics Collectibles contributed an estimated £1.2b to Fanatics’ overall £6.2b revenue in 2024, mainly through trading cards.
While Fanatics Collectibles—who have longstanding exclusive licensing arrangements with the MLB, NFL and the NBA—already offer trading cards for the UEFA Women’s Champions League and women’s basketball on collegiate level in the US, they wanted to do more. For the Women’s EUROs in Switzerland this July, Fanatics Collectibles and Topps have partnered with UEFA to, for the first time ever, launch a WEURO sticker collection, partnering with the likes of two-time Ballon D'or winner Alexia Putellas and Jill Scott to appeal to the historically ignored fans of women’s football and sports.
"We want to bring more women to our overall collector universe. Today, many men collect trading cards and sticker albums, but on the women's side, we have a much bigger job to do. Especially with the younger girls. When girls see female athletes on trading cards, it's so inspiring. There's so much storytelling behind those trading cards, and it just showcases what the fandom could look like and what it could be some day”, says Yoo. “Women collect many different things. I collect art, some people collect seashells, and women are avid sports fans too. So, introducing this is a way to enhance their fandom journey. This is a time dedicated to women's football."
One of the most crucial threads in this web of growing the women's game is, of course, the players. One of them, Mina Schaathun Bergersen, who plays as midfielder for FC Como Women, also attended the black-tie event. What did the event tell her about where women’s football is today? “When you see all these cool and smart people here working for the sports, it feels like women’s football is in good hands. And you also get to see that there is a business behind it. People are also here because they see (women’s football) as a big opportunity, and they really believe it's going to grow and it’s a movement to invest in.”
For her, signing for F.C. Como Women was an eye-opener: “When I signed, I didn't think so much about all the women involved in the club. But now, I think it is so inspiring to see so many powerful women that are really dedicated to helping other women, and how they are growing the game. And Victoire being a woman owning the club, it really shows us what we can do.”
Mercury/13 are set to expand their portfolio of teams in the near future. Watch this space...
