American football’s elite NFL has announced a new exclusive multi-year partnership with sports merchandising giant Fanatics concerning the league’s “global marquee events”.
Through the agreement, which serves as an expansion of the pair’s existing 10-year deal, Fanatics will serve as the on-site retail operations manager for all of the league’s tentpole events.
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This list includes the annual NFL Draft, the Super Bowl, the NFL Kickoff Game, NFL international games, NFL Flag Football Championships, the NFL Scouting Combine, and the Pro Bowl.
This will begin with the 2026 NFL Draft, which starts tonight (April 23) and will run through April 25.
While Fanatics has managed on-site retail for the International Games in the past, this marks the first time that it will do the same for the Super Bowl, the league’s showpiece finale, and the NFL Draft.
This will include managing retail operations in-stadium and on-site at these events, as well as at various retail touchpoints around the respective host cities.
Speaking on the announcement, NFL senior vice president for consumer products and licensing Casey Collins said: “As the NFL has grown into a year-round, global event leader, Fanatics has established itself as the perfect partner to meet consumer demand for the best merchandise possible.”
Fanatics' business affairs president Gary Gertzog added: “Fanatics and the NFL have built a truly collaborative, cross-functional business together, and this partnership is a testament to that growth and a look to the future.
“The League is reaching more fans across more countries each year, and we believe that our global scale and expertise in merchandising and retail operations set us up perfectly to super-serve the fan experience across these coveted, marquee sports moments.”
Fanatics has been the league’s e-commerce partner since 2020 in a deal running through the 2029-2030 campaign, granting it exclusive consumer product licensing rights to manufacture and distribute all products designed by Nike, the US sportswear giant that is the NFL’s official apparel partner.
Furthermore, the merchandising heavyweight is also the e-commerce partner for 29 of the league’s 32 franchises, and operates in-venue physical retail for 16 of those 29 teams, granting it dominant coverage for half of the league.
This news comes as the NFL has issued a statement defending itself from allegations of antitrust violations from the US Department of Justice (DOJ).
The DOJ has put the league under investigation regarding its broadcast and media rights distribution practices, particularly in order to review the antitrust exemptions afforded to the league, relating to the 1961 Sports Broadcasting Act, and how many games the league makes free-to-air, versus paywalled fixtures.
This complaint particularly focuses on the migration of many NFL games to OTT streaming services Prime Video, Netflix, and Peacock, as well as the out-of-market Sunday Ticket offering (which already underwent an antitrust suit in 2024) and its distribution partnership with YouTube TV.
In a statement, an NFL spokesperson said: “The NFL’s media distribution model is the most fan and broadcaster-friendly in the entire sports and entertainment industry.
“With over 87% of our games on free, broadcast television, including 100% of games in the markets of the competing teams, the NFL has for decades put our fans front and center in how we distribute our content.
“The 2025 season was our most viewed since 1989 and reflects the strength of the NFL distribution model and its wide availability to all fans.”
