The numbers behind the Women’s World Cup ⚽

Sascha: [00:00:02] Welcome to the day of the podcast that asks Who says business news needs to be old business? You can't have missed it. 

Audio Clip: [00:00:10] Well, Australia and New Zealand are on track to host one of the largest football tournaments in the history of the women's game. When the FIFA Women's World Cup kicks off tomorrow night in New Zealand as well as Australia. 

Sascha: [00:00:20] The Women's World Cup has come to town and there's been a big conversation in the lead up to this World Cup around prize money because FIFA offers women one quarter as much prize money as the men. The 2023 World Cup has a total prize pool of $110 million compared to the 440 million for the men's World Cup last year. Was Diego Costa even aware? 

Audio Clip: [00:00:45] That the Ghanaian striker Williams was. 

Sascha: [00:00:48] Behind him? Now there's people who argue on both sides of this argument. On the one hand, equal pay for equal work or in this case equal accomplishment and on the other hand, pay should reflect the money that you're creating. Now, we're not here to make a case either way. Instead, we thought we could do our job as a business podcast and add some more numbers to this conversation so you can have more context. The next time you see an argument spring up in the comments section on social media, or perhaps the next time an argument springs up at the pub. It's Friday, the 21st of July. And today I want to know what are the numbers behind the Women's World Cup? To talk about this today, I'm joined by my colleague and the co-founder of Equity Mates, Alec Renehan. Alec. Welcome to The Dive anchor the Matildas. 

Alec: [00:01:36] Sascha, Good to be here. World Cup fever has really hit Australian shores. I made a joke in our team meeting this morning that Australians are buzzing for the World Cup until they're all reminded they don't really like soccer. But I think you made the point that the one thing Australians do love is winning. Yes. And we've actually got a chance to win a World Cup here. So it's pretty exciting. 

Sascha: [00:02:00] Yeah, I know. So it's an interesting to see whether this fever slowly builds or dissipates by this time next week. Look, I just want to acknowledge that we're framing this prize money conversation as a financial question, but many arguments around this pay dispute are not financial, so this is an incomplete but hopefully helpful episode. Alec. 

Alec: [00:02:20] Yeah, I think that's an important place to start. There's yeah, as you said, a number of non-financial reasons that more pay would grow the game and actually then bring more money in. You know where there's an investing podcast here and there's investments to be made but we just wanted to look at the business behind the World Cup so people listening can have some more context on how the money actually flows when it comes to these massive football tournaments. 

Sascha: [00:02:46] The Women's World Cup kicked off in Australia and New Zealand last night. Now I am renowned for my sporting knowledge. Not true at all, but this certainly even to me feels like the biggest women's World Cup in history. 

Alec: [00:02:59] Yeah. Now, last night as people are listening, but it's tonight as we record, so we actually don't know if New Zealand and Australia open their accounts with a win post.

Unidentified: [00:03:10] Arriving deflected and Shani Grant, that's her first ever Matilda's goal. 

Alec: [00:03:16] But what is clear is that the women's game is growing and the numbers support that. The number of teams at this World Cup has been expanded from 24 to 32. The number of attendees is expected to be higher 1.2 million in France 2019 compared to 1.5 million expected this year. The number of TV viewers is growing. FIFA has set a goal to reach a global audience of 2 billion people for this World Cup, up from 1.12 billion in France just four years ago, according to FIFA. The prize money is also growing. It's triple what it was at France in 2019. But as you said, Sascha, it's still a quarter of what the men got paid in Qatar last year. And that is where the controversy sits in the lead up to the World Cup. I want to also acknowledge that the Matildas had a big symbolic win last Friday, and it wasn't on the pitch against France. It was in crowd numbers because the Matildas crowd of 50,629 beat the crowds at the AFL, Brisbane, v Melbourne and the Nrlw Newcastle v Wests Tigers. They didn't quite beat the TV viewers, but getting more people to their game on a Friday night is a big achievement. 

Sascha: [00:04:34] That is a symbolic win, especially in Melbourne where, you know, AFL reigned supreme. But let's turn to the business of the Women's World Cup. What are the biggest key revenue drivers? 

Alec: [00:04:46] Yeah, so in any sport there's four key revenue drivers to be aware of. The biggest one these days is TV broadcast rights. Then we've got sponsorship, third merch sales and then finally live tickets. 

Sascha: [00:04:59] Well, you know, I love TV, so let's get stuck into that first. 

Alec: [00:05:03] Yeah. So this World Cup's momentous because the 2023 Women's World Cup has been the first Women's World Cup to have its broadcast rights sold as a standalone product rather than just being packaged as a bonus for the broadcasters that buy the men's World Cup. There are arguments for and against that, and we'll get to some of the issues that it's caused in a sec. But I think it's worth acknowledging that now scene is a product in and of itself. Let's start in Australia. Optus bought the rights for this Women's World Cup for $13 million. I have a massive gripe with the fact that Optus is able to buy it. They bought all 64 games, they sell 15 on to Channel seven and they're the 15 games that we can watch on free to air for most sports. There's these anti-siphoning regimes where you get it on free to air, you get most of it on free to air to stop the pay TV guys blocking it. But in this case, Optus was able to siphon the majority of the games. So anyway, that's a gripe. 

Sascha: [00:06:04] I know it's a rabbit hole, but I appreciate the gripe being aired. 

Alec: [00:06:09] But thank you. I appreciate you appreciating it. But 13 million for Optus for this World Cup. Compare that to the 20 million that SBS paid for the Qatar World Cup and the discrepancy isn't actually as big as I first thought it would be 20 million for 13 million, 64 games, 32 times. So the tournament is the same size now, not that different. That's Australia though. Over in Europe, it's very. Different story. And it's been quite a controversial story. So there's the big five European markets in world football, UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. 

Audio Clip: [00:06:46] And it's just what Spain wanted. An early goal to settle the nerves together.

Alec: [00:06:52] Those five markets paid between 100 and 200 million for the men's World Cup last year. Hmm. Hmm. Apparently, according to FIFA, they only offered between one and 10 million for the TV rights for the women's game. 

Sascha: [00:07:05] Oh, okay. Yeah.

Alec: [00:07:07] Reports were that Italy were the worst. They paid €160 million for the men's tournament last year. They offered 300,000 for the women's game. Wow. Now, FIFA, to their credit, came out quite critically and they said the president of FIFA, Gianni Infantino, said it is our moral and legal obligation not to undersell the FIFA Women's World Cup. So I respect that. And they basically said we're not going to block out the World Cup in these countries unless you pay more. They eventually did reach a deal. I don't think the numbers have been disclosed. The important thing to stress here is that on FIFA's numbers, the viewing figures for the women's event are between 50 and 60% of what they are for the men's. So about half of the TV viewers and the bids from Europe were coming in at 100th of the price. Yeah. So a massive discrepancy. 

Sascha: [00:08:09] To quote one of my favourite sayings of late. The maths ain't nothing on that one. 

Alec: [00:08:14] The Europeans defended themselves and said it's the time difference because Australia is on the other side of the world and I think a lot of the games will be kicking off in the morning over in Europe. But we don't see that same discrepancy when you know, the Ashes is played in Australia and English broadcasters are paying for it or the Rugby World Cup in Australia. So, you know, maybe to some extent, but not to this extent. 

Sascha: [00:08:40] Well, let's move on to sponsors because that's another big money-maker I from nowhere to hide from so many sponsors. 

Alec: [00:08:50] There is a massive discrepancy here. So analytics firm Global Data has done the numbers. They expect the Women's World Cup this year to generate just over 300 million in sponsorship revenue for FIFA. For comparison, the World Cup in Qatar last year, the men's World Cup brought in 6.3 billion. Sponsorship revenue. So it's 5% of what the men's game brought in. There are some caveats, but they don't totally make up the discrepancy. But there are some caveats. Firstly, the TV rights saga in Europe and around the world, because they were slow to sell the rights basically everywhere. A lot of advertisers were then reluctant to throw their weight behind the tournament, to invest some money in the tournament because they were worried that FIFA wouldn't sell the rights that would block it out in these like European markets. So we've only seen several of the big sponsors come through. Very light partnerships with Unilever and McDonald's were announced in May, So two months before the tournament kicks off. AB InBev, the massive alcohol brand, signed up in June, just a month before the tournament kicked off, and a collaboration with Tik-tok to provide tailored World Cup content was announced a week before the tournament was due to start literally last week. So you can say that like the flow on effects of the broadcast issues then had an effect on the advertising budgets. There was also another screw up from FIFA. I'm calling it a screw up. That's my editorial judgement, right? FIFA were in talks with Saudi Arabian tourism to be the major sponsor or a major sponsor for the Women's World Cup. Saudi Arabia, not a great supporter of the women's game. Yeah, and there was a pretty obvious and loud public backlash that rightfully criticised that association. And so then FIFA dropped that sponsorship, but then they were behind the eight ball in, I guess, making up that budget. 

Sascha: [00:10:53] I'm going to let that editorial judgement through to the keeper for sure. So Alec, you've covered sponsors and broadcasting. There is one area, though, where women are beating the men. We're going to talk about that after the break. Welcome back to The Dive. Go the Matildas. We're in the middle of World Cup fever, a team of 23 that has a country of 25 million right behind it. Tonight the Matildas has unveiled its squad for the always exciting when the world comes to Australia. Alike we've covered the revenue discrepancies on sponsors and broadcasting, but you've promised me that there is an area where women are beating the men. What is it? 

Alec: [00:11:39] Aside from actual chances of winning the damn thing, where the women are doing much better than men? I think even the men's team would agree with that, to be honest. But one area where the women in Australia where the women's team is beating the men's team is merch sales. Can now Nike are the Jersey sponsor and they are I guess quite secretive in terms of actual numbers of jerseys sold. But they've come out in the press and told the world, well, told Australia, I don't think the world cares too much. But they've told Australia that the women's team have sold more jerseys ahead of the the Women's World Cup than the men's team managed both before and during and since the Qatar World Cup last year. So basically the Matildas haven't played a game yet and they've already outsold the men's jersey from last year. 

Sascha: [00:12:41] That's pretty impressive. It's almost inspiring me to go investigate whether I need to get, you know, I love much. Maybe I need to get one. 

Alec: [00:12:51] Maybe if we were bigger, we could have got some free jerseys. So that's our inspiration for the 2027 World Cup. 

Sascha: [00:12:59] Absolutely. Let's turn to the lost revenue driver now. And that's ticket sales. People actually going to the matches. 

Alec: [00:13:07] There's a really good story brewing here. We'll tell the story, then we'll compare it to the men's World Cup last year. But one day out from the start of the tournament, we were just shy of 1.4 million tickets sold for the 64 matches. Now, the previous record was from the Canadian World Cup eight years ago, where 1.35 million tickets were sold. Caveat the number of teams on the number of matches has expanded. This time it's gone from 52 matches to 64. But hey, the record is the record, and that's great to say. Reports are tournament organisers are targeting 1.5 million tickets for the tournament. But to get there, Sascha, our friends across the ditch are going to have to lift because New Zealand is letting us down. There is a real enthusiasm gap between the two host nations.

Audio Clip: [00:13:58] In the rugby heartland of New Zealand. There have been struggles to sell tickets.

Alec: [00:14:02] According to The Daily Mail. Caveat Daily Mail. Just one third of New Zealand's tickets have been sold. And they're going to pretty extreme lengths to fill the stadiums They. New Zealand recently gave away 20,000 free tickets to matches in New Zealand for some of the, I guess, less popular games. Prominent Kiwis have been asked to really get out and support these efforts. Former Prime minister Jacinda Ardern has been using her profile to urge people to attend matches. A key reason for the enthusiasm gap is that the Matildas are world beaters led by one of the best players in the world in Sam Kerr and New Zealand are not. And so that's been a bit of a challenge for New Zealand. But overall, Sascha, the aim of 1.5 million tickets sold across the tournament is something really exciting and something to be really proud of. It's not quite what the men's tournament achieved in Qatar. They sold 2.89 million tickets before that. In Russia in 2018, it was 2.4 million tickets. So, you know, not as many, but still a really good number. The one caveat there is ticket prices. Simon, who works for us here at equity markets and was at Qatar, was asking him how much he paid for his tickets. And he was saying about 150 Aussie to go to a game. I've got tickets for Sunday night and they were 20 bucks a game. So ticket prices are different. So the money that is being generated by ticket sales would be different. But just the sheer volume of people going into stadiums is a great story. 

Sascha: [00:15:42] So Alec, in conclusion, what do you think these numbers tell us? 

Alec: [00:15:46] Yes. So for me, you know, the capitalist in me, there's one clear takeaway. It's that if the viewing numbers are about half, you know, 2.9 million ticket sales compared to 1.5 million or on FIFA's number of TV broadcasts, 50 to 60% are watching the women's as big as would be watching the men. So let's say the audience is about half, but the sponsorship revenue is 5% of what the men got. And, you know, over in Europe, they're paying cents on the dollar for TV broadcasts. It feels as a market opportunity that it feels like while advertisers should understand that there's a audience price mismatch and stop buying the cheaper version of the women's game. 

Sascha: [00:16:32] Yeah, absolutely. I think like there is a massive opportunity there. So that's our pitch. But where to from here? 

Alec: [00:16:39] So on the prize money conversation, we said we weren't going to make a case. Either way. There's plenty of people out there having those arguments already. But FIFA are aiming to equalise prize money by the next iteration of the men's and Women's World Cup. So 2026 for the men, 2027 for the women. So I think it's important to stress that if you're really exerting a lot of energy on social media, making these arguments, FIFA are going to correct this pay imbalance in the next World Cup anyway. So maybe save the stress, save your arguments and get off social media.

Sascha: [00:17:17] And enjoy the game, turn on the television. Or if you're in Sydney, buy a ticket, buy some merch. Yeah, exactly. I think that's been really fascinating. I've really appreciated you going into those numbers today. I also want to take the opportunity to just recommend something from a back catalogue if you're a new listener to The Dive. We did an episode last year called Women's Football The Case for Reparations, and that was such a fascinating story. I talked to a journalist from the Financial Times. Definitely if soccer's wheelhouse, even if it's not and you're just really interested in this conversation, go check that out. 

Alec: [00:17:50] Put it this way. In the in the early 1920s, women's football was bigger than men's football. Go and find out how. 

Sascha: [00:17:58] Alec, Thanks so much for joining me on The Dive today. I'll be back in your feed next week. 

Alec: [00:18:02] Thanks, Sascha.