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Topps and parent company Fanatics aren’t saying it explicitly, but their recent trading card offerings reflect an unavoidable truth: Millennial sports fans are getting old.
Born between 1981 and 1996, the most wizened millennials will be 43 this year. They’ve already watched Peyton and Eli Manning go from champion quarterbacks to personalities and pitchmen, and Mia Hamm, Julie Foudy and Abby Wambach go from U.S. World Cup soccer icons to part owners of the National Women’s Soccer League’s Angel City FC.
Within the last three years alone, millennials have also watched Serena Williams, Tom Brady, Megan Rapinoe, Roger Federer, Sue Bird, Rob Gronkowski, Allyson Felix, J.J. Watt and Sylvia Fowles—among others—walk away from their respective games. With Tiger Woods breaking from Nike to join TaylorMade and LeBron James leaving a longtime deal with Upper Deck, Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin and Fanatics Collectibles CEO Mike Mahan saw a generational transition and a chance to link an outgoing past with an incoming present.
“The core collector is passionate: They recognize collecting for its intrinsic value in the collection of cards, and the cards themselves have meaning, value and, in most cases, they hold memories,” said Ken Turner, CMO of Fanatics. “As a great marketer, you want to be able to trigger those memories.”
Last year, Topps used its partnership with Brady to promote draft-pick cards from its Bowman brand with a full ad campaign imagining what it would’ve been like if the six-time Super Bowl winner had instead started a baseball career with the Montreal Expos when they drafted him in 1995. The ad includes Brady’s would-be teammates and former Expos Pedro Martinez, Larry Walker and Vladimir Guerrero, whose son Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is an All-Star for the Toronto Blue Jays.
In James’ case, Topps used an image of him in his St. Vincent-St. Mary High School uniform and paired it with one of his son Bronny playing at the University of Southern California for its Bowman Chrome series—surrounding it with a campaign that also included Iowa hoops star Caitlin Clark and Seattle baseball All-Star Julio Rodriguez.
