Sports are at the center of the sports industry. Without sports, sports events, and sports fans; there would be no sports industry. Sports fans make it all happen. Fans drive sports industry revenue by attending and viewing sports events. But which sports have the most fans?
Soccer is king. Over half of the planet watches soccer, a sport that originated in China in the 2nd century. It’s the most popular sport in Europe, Asia, Africa, and South America. However, who would have thought that Cricket would have been the second-largest watched sport by 2.5 billion people, a sport originating in 1646.
Basketball with 2.4 billion global fans was played with a soccer ball until 1936. Hockey including ice and field hockey has 2.2 billion fans worldwide. As shown, American favorites; baseball and football have fewer fans than sports not typically viewed in the United States(1). These fans generate billions of dollars in attending and viewing sports events as well as buying team and player merchandise.
FAN ENGAGEMENT: Fan engagement is one of three domains of the global sports industry. In 2019 fan engagement was $586.3 billion.
This is 25.3 % of this $2.3 trillion global sports industry where the remaining revenues are derived from sports products and sports participation. But let’s dig a little deeper into fan engagement revenues.
The primary source of fan engagement revenues is sports events. But this is one of three core areas of fan engagement. As shown in the figure below, sports events account for $194.7 billion in revenue worldwide. Gate revenues of $49.4 billion include ticket sales, parking, and food and beverage sales. Media rights ($37.8 billion) are paid to broadcast these sports events and sponsorship ($68.5 billion) is paid for advertising at sports events. Merchandise sales are $22.2 billion and venue construction is $16.8 billion. If there are no fans, these revenues disappear.
Fan engagement and the revenues generated are much, much bigger. Sports media deliver live and replayed broadcasts and commentary on these sports events. Globally, in 2019 this amounted to $102.1 billion. Most of this was in media broadcast advertising ($71.9 billion).
An even bigger part of fan engagement revenues is sports entertainment which was $289.5 billion in 2019. Most of this aspect of fan engagement is in sports betting ($233.9 billion). The remainder of fan-based sports entertainment revenues is generated by Fantasy Sports, Esports, Sports Video Games, Sports Movies & Collectibles, and Sports Bars.
Fan engagement generated $586.3 billion in 2019 and only $49.4 billion was what fans paid at the sports event. Revenues generated by sports media and sports entertainment are clearly multiples of fan enragement revenues.
The information in this blog was derived from Chapter 1, “Defining the Sports Industry,” in The Global Sports Industry, by Dr. Roger Best and Dr. Dennis Howard (www.globalsportsinsights.com).
