Fanatics teams up with IOC to create ecomm platform

New platform to help IOC engage with fans in between Games.

Licensed merchandise giant Fanatics has announced its latest partnership with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which will see the merchandise firm develop the first-ever permanent ecommerce platform for the Olympic Games.

Fanatics will also join as the Official Ecommerce Partner, which will see it create the official Olympic Shop and integrate marketplaces for the Paris 2024, Milano Cortina 2026 and Los Angeles 2028 Games. Fanatics has also obtained rights to develop Olympic-branded merchandise for the three Games.

Previously, the official online stores for the Olympics Games had always been with the individual organising committees, but this led to no consistent approach, a limited worldwide reach and no knowledge sharing. To avoid all these shortcomings, the IOC has taken matters into its own hands.

The IOC now has the ability to interact with the fans in between the Games, which will help the Committee generate more revenue and gather valuable data as well.

Timo Lumme, Television and Marketing Services, Managing Director, IOC, stated:

“This is an exciting launch for us, as fans from an increasing number of territories will be able to purchase official Olympic merchandising and connect with the magic of the Olympic Games ahead of each edition.

“We are looking forward to collaborating on this new shop with the organising committees of Paris 2024, Milano Cortina 2026 and LA28 to engage with a broader fanbase and offer collectibles and goods that convey the values of the Olympic movement, in line with the IOC global licensing strategy.”

Greg Gertzog, President, Business Affairs, Fanatics, added:

“We thought our experience working with top-tier sports around the world, the tech we could deploy and the data they would receive, we thought they would be well suited.

“We believe by far and away we have the best tech platform in the business. It needs to have great speed [and capacity] so that if something amazing happens on the field and people want to buy something it can handle millions of people wanting to buy a product. Our site is secure, fast and stable, and easy to navigate.

“[Merchandise] is all we’ve done for more than 20 years, working with great sports organisations and [accumulating] knowledge and contacts across sports. We see the Olympics as one of, if not the, premier sporting events in the world. We look at the Olympics as an area that isn’t fulfilling its potential in terms of the products on offer and how they are offered.

“We see this as just the beginning. We see this as the start of a broad partnership with the Olympic movement.”

The Olympic Shop will be live across the world by summer 2022, except in China and Russia. The IOC has a separate e-commerce agreement for China with Alibaba.