ICLV Day 1: Winning big - Sports and Entertainment Strategy

Greetings from Kansas City! Day 1 was terrific. Great panels, excellent conversations, heard from two mayors, amazing people on the trip together. Today’s highlight for me was the panel that discussed KC’s strategy to host the 2026 World Cup. 
 
This particular panel included Pam Kramer, KC’s FIFA World Cup 2026 CEO;  Derek Byrne, Director of Content Strategy with Visit KC; and Jeremy Slavens, VP of Arrowhead Events with the Kansas City Chiefs. Our moderator was Lester Bagley, EVP of Public Affairs with the MN Vikings. 
 
Derek described their approach to win the bid: “none of us was big enough on our own; everyone had to come together. And the theme of our bid was ‘unity.’” For context the region is smaller than MSP, #33 largest region compared to MSP coming in at #16.  But this region’s relationships are quite complex given that they must navigate two significant cities, (KC-MO and KC-K), 5 separate counties, and several other cities.  They brought in dozens of communities and civic partners to make the deal work; the state invested $10M; all the sports teams, and powerful civic partners contributed as well.
 
I was simply relaxing into the panelists’ comments when one attendee asked the question: “how do you advocate as a region without ‘stealing’ from one city or another?” Pam’s answer put it into laser focus for me: “we stayed out of anything that wasn’t our priority. And we focused on all the ways we were stronger together and leveraged those. We wanted to speak to the people who were visiting our region. Those people don’t focus on what city or state they are in. They focus on the venues, the hotels, the hospitality. The experiences draw them in, and they love the region for it.” 
 
Early economic impact and perception change numbers are telling as well:

• Of the estimated 650K visitors to KC during the World Cup, approximately 50% were from out of state; and 14% of those were international. 
• KC hosted 4 of the international teams. The KC Chiefs hosted 6 matches at Arrowhead Stadium. 
• Oxford Economics: of the top 50 metro regions, over the course of the World Cup period KC was #2 for inbound visits. #1 was Seattle (another World Cup city).  
• Halo effect has begun as well: after the World Cup, hotel revenue up about 12%, compared to the national average of 7%. 
• Net promoter score (measure of perception) went up significantly after World Cup: “we want to be seen as a place where important, exciting things happen.” The best headlines came from the New York Times: “The smallest host city has the world at its feet.”

 
Together these partners – and so many others – developed a World Cup strategy with the messaging, you can do big things here.  In Pam’s words, “We used sports to get people to pay attention, so we can show them who we are.”  
 
In the Twin Cities we have Minnesota Sports and Events, a nonprofit that works to bring major sporting and cultural events to Minnesota, mainly the Twin Cities. It was created by leaders of Minnesota’s sports franchises, business community, and the hospitality industry to formalize and expand the work that had already been done to attract major events like Super Bowl LII.  We have the very real opportunity to keep working together to bring in similar types of investments that also build up the reputation of our region.
 
See you in the trenches, 
B

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