Panini America Partners with The Brandr Group on Collegiate NIL Initiatives
Irving, TX – September 4, 2024 – As it continues to strengthen and expand its presence and product offerings in the NIL space, Panini America, the world’s largest sports and entertainment collectibles company, announced today a multi-year partnership with leading NIL agency The Brandr Group.
Panini recently introduced Panini College, a dedicated NIL platform that enables all athletes at a partner university to have their own Panini trading card under the Panini NIL brand. The platform – www.college.paniniamerica.net – has initially launched with football and volleyball athletes from Ohio State University, the University of Nebraska and the University of Texas, via The Brandr Group's group licensing programs at those universities. Panini expects to onboard additional schools through the remainder of the year.
In collaboration with The Brandr Group, Panini College will expand to additional partner schools, sports and athletes throughout the country. The Brandr Group will assist Panini with numerous aspects of the platform, including securing and managing select school and athlete relationships, plus providing support for certain elements of the product development process.
“Our Panini College platform illustrates our belief that collegiate athletes in all sports should have the ability to have their own trading card,” said Jason Howarth, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Athlete Relations. “The Brandr Group is also a leader in the NIL space, with a tremendous roster of partners and programs, so for us to collaborate with their team to help grow our Panini College platform is a natural fit. We will work together to create and enhance opportunities that benefit athletes, schools and fans.”
“We are excited to be partnered with Panini, as truly they are a leading global company in officially licensed sports card and collectable products space,” said Wesley Haynes, CEO of The Brandr Group. “We share their vision for democratizing NIL products so the largest breadth of student-athletes possible have the ability to have their own trading card through their innovative on-demand offering for the schools where Panini has robust trading card rights. We think Panini’s planned product innovations and scaled product offerings will quickly become popular with college athletes, fans, collectors and consumers across the country. This is an exciting new and differentiated addition to the NIL group rights space for college, and TBG is thrilled to be able to help bring Panini's best practices from the professional league space to college athletes across the country."
The Panini NIL platform is the latest extension of Panini’s commanding presence in the collegiate NIL space. Panini’s athlete partnerships include University of Nebraska volleyball All-American Lexi Rodriguez, who was the brand’s first female NIL athlete, and several current collegiate athletes, including exclusive athletes Quinn Ewers, V.J. Edgecombe, Tre Johnson, Arch Manning, Dylan Raiola, Julian Sayin and Zachariah Branch. Panini offers several collegiate-focused products, and earlier this year launched the enormously popular Caitlin Clark Collection, a multi-card set that celebrates Clark’s legendary basketball career at the University of Iowa.
About Panini America
Panini America is a subsidiary of The Panini Group, established over 60 years ago in Modena, Italy with subsidiaries throughout Europe, Latin America and the United States. Panini is the world leader in officially licensed collectibles and is the most significant publisher of collectibles in the U.S., with official licenses for NFL, NFLPA, NBA, NBPA, NASCAR, FIFA, LIV Golf, WWE, the Professional Fighters League, College, Disney, and other key properties from many other licensors. Panini is also the exclusive trading card and sticker partner of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, Elite 11 and Pop Warner Little Scholars, Inc.
Panini has distribution channels in more than 150 countries and employs a staff of more than 1,200. For more information visit us at www.paniniamerica.net, www.paninigroup.com or
http://blog.paniniamerica.net/. You can also follow Panini America on social media platforms Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.
About The Brandr Group
The Brandr Group (TBG) has emerged as the leading marketing agency in the college NIL group licensing and brand activation program space, with group NIL rights for more than 20,000 student-athletes at more than 100 universities and colleges, including more than 60% of the Power Four schools. TBG partners with prominent brands, sponsors, corporate trademarks, and events to cultivate, diversify and monetize intellectual property of athletes and schools through professional brand management and licensing endeavors. For more information, please visit tbgusa.com or email us at GroupRights@tbgusa.com.
