By Cameron Walter
According to CNBC, sports tourism is one of the fastest-growing tourism sectors today. On the surface this may seem odd, but when you really look at it, it makes total sense and boasts real marketing implications. Because, in many ways, sports have become the last and most meaningful frontier of human connection.
Loneliness and Sports
One of the most important roles that sports is playing today is in soothing record levels of societal loneliness. According to a recent Healthy Minds Monthly Poll, 30% of respondents ages 18 to 34 feel lonely every day or several times a week, and 50% of individuals report using TV, podcasts, or social media to ease loneliness.
However, Americans are catching on to the limitations of “digitally interfacing” as a solution for loneliness. Many seem to be craving the endorphin boost that in-person sporting experiences provide—a “spectator therapy of sorts.” The New York Post recently coined a term, “Funflation,” to describe this phenomenon, when they witnessed a sudden 25% rise in ticket prices to sporting events.
I heard about this firsthand from a few friends in my hometown of Boston, who saw spectators pay upwards of $200 to attend a Celtics watch party in the TD Garden while the team was on the road in Dallas—$200, just to watch a sports team play on a jumbotron somewhere less comfortable than their own home. The price is astronomical. Comical. Exorbitant. But it speaks to the value people place today on meaningful points of in-person human connection, with sports at its epicenter.
Sports as a Unifying Force
Beyond loneliness, sporting events are serving to bring Americans together in a time when disagreement has become an unfortunate cultural norm. According to Pew Research, 65% of Americans currently say that they always or often feel exhausted when thinking about politics, and Axios reports that “America’s deepest partisan divides are getting deeper.”
In all of this disaccord, sports offer something extremely rare: a space and time to celebrate the values that we have in common, however surface-level they may seem. Adedayo Ibikunle summarized this well in a recent post for Medium, when he wrote, “In today’s increasingly fragmented world, sports provide a common ground for diverse groups to come together, practice tolerance, and celebrate shared values.”
When you’re in an arena, whether you’re cheering for the same team or opposing sides, you share a few things in common: your fandom for the sport and your love for your team. The significance of finding points of human agreement—in moments so rife with volatility, violence, and upheaval—simply cannot be overstated.
Marketing Implications
As marketers, the opportunity is clear: Take a page out of the sports tourism playbook. In a time when loneliness and volatility run rampant, brands can create experiences where belonging and community is not only easily accessible, but readily anticipated.
In short? Listen to the ‘underlying chant’ from the stands.
