Goodbye, FedEx Field. Hello, Northwest Stadium.
In a sports-marketing first, the $4.7 billion-asset Northwest Federal Credit Union in Herndon, Virginia, has secured naming rights to a National Football League franchise's home venue, striking a multi-year deal with the Washington Commanders on Wednesday.
At its heart, the pact provides Northwest exclusive branding across the 67,617-seat stadium in Landover, Maryland, including a new logo featured on exterior and interior signage. Neither the Commanders nor Northwest Federal disclosed terms of their accord. Street and Smith's Sports Business Journal cited unnamed sources reporting it at eight years for $8 million to $9 million annually. A Northwest Federal Credit Union representative had not responded to a reporter's inquiry at deadline.
In some sports marketing circles, reaction to news of Northwest's partnership with the Commanders was something akin to shock. "It's difficult just with budget sizes for a smaller institution to do something like this," Josh Mabus, owner of the Mabus Agency, a Tupelo, Mississippi-based marketing firm that works with banks and financial technology companies, said in an interview.
FedEx, the Commanders' previous naming-rights partner, had paid $205 million for a 27-year agreement in 1999. That averages $7.6 million a year, far above the annual marketing budgets for most community banks, according to Mabus.
By winning Washington's naming rights, the $4.6 billion-asset Northwest joins a list of elite corporations, including AT&T, Mercedes Benz, Ford, Levi's and Gillette, with their names emblazoned atop an NFL stadium. Northwest is the first credit union to gain entry into the club, though three banks own NFL stadium naming rights. The Carolina Panthers play at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, and the Jacksonville Jaguars play at EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville, Florida, while U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis is home to the Minnesota Vikings. The smallest of the three, the $40 billion-asset EverBank, is nearly 10 times Northwest's asset size.
"We look forward to ensuring that Northwest Stadium is an impactful place where we rally together over our common love of football, giving back to the community, and creating memorable experiences that last a lifetime," Northwest CEO Jeff Bentley said Wednesday in a press release.
Prior to Wednesday, the $19.3 billion-asset Golden 1 Credit Union in Sacramento, California, was the only credit union with a major sport naming rights deal, involving the home arena for the National Basketball Association's Sacramento Kings.
Northwest's naming rights deal came six months after previous holder Federal Express cut ties with the Commanders, taking advantage of the team's recent change in ownership to end its arrangement two years early. That opened the window for Northwest, which had established itself as the team's official credit union partner in 2023.
Professional football has ranked as America's most popular sport since the early 1970s, so the partnership with the Commanders will shine a bright light on Northwest. Mabus characterized the attention as "name identification and awareness" but added Northwest shouldn't be shy about injecting a business dimension into the relationship. "A [financial institution] has the ability to do business with the organization, so what we try to broker are cash-neutral deals," Mabus said. "I think it would be silly to be a bank and sponsor a thing and not ask that organization or entities within the stadium to do business…Give me something back. Let's do something quid pro quo."
"Anything makes sense if it's cash-neutral," Mabus said. "I would do any sponsorship, any promotion if we're getting business that's equal to it and we also get the name idea and awareness that comes along with naming rights and sales."
Naming rights deals can pay for themselves "if activated properly," Sean Barror, founder and chief revenue officer at New York-based marketing agency Allied Sports, wrote Thursday in an email to American Banker. "The deal gives you permission to show up amongst the team's fan base and community," Barror wrote. "Brands who invest in telling compelling stories authentic to the team and its community will see impact to their business."
In a similar vein, Mabus said he strives for agreements that "allow me some messaging opportunity where we can convey the value of the bank…You've got to make sure your values are being portrayed as well, beyond just name, idea and awareness."
While naming rights deals have potential to boost sales and market position, one key drawback lies in the fact a significant portion of any sports audience is focused on the game "and couldn't give a rip whose name is on the side of the stadium," Tyler Reed, director of content strategy at the Jacksonville, Florida-based digital public relations and content firm Bizwrite, wrote Thursday in an email to American Banker. By contrast, traditional media offers "targeted engagement at a lower cost," and social media "provides highly measurable engagement metrics and ultra-precise audience targeting," Reed wrote.
"It's crucial to consider these high-profile [stadium deals are not standalone strategies and should integrate with the company's overall marketing mix," Reed wrote.
Banking groups, which have long criticized credit unions' exemption from federal and state income taxes, were quick to criticize Northwest's agreement with the Commanders. Independent Community Bankers of America President and CEO Rebecca Romero Rainey in a statement called it "just the latest example of how credit unions are violating the limits established by Congress to justify their federal tax exemption."
"The credit union tax exemption now subsidizes multi-million-dollar executive pay, outsized marketing budgets, lavish headquarters, and an ongoing surge in
