New York Giants and Gotham FC co-owner Carolyn Tisch Blodgett is betting that artificial intelligence will transform women’s sports into a major moneymaker.
“If AI allows you to be more efficient, that will completely change the direction of women’s sports,” Tisch Blodgett said during Business Insider’s Run event Thursday afternoon.
Tisch Blodgett, principal owner of the National Women’s Soccer League’s Gotham FC, sees artificial intelligence as a way to lower operating costs for sports businesses without cutting corners.
“Many parts of a sports team are expensive to run. Running a stadium, running a ticketing team, running a marketing team are all expensive,” Tisch Blodgett said.
These struggles are even more intense for women’s sports, which historically have not received the same level of investment as men’s sports.
Tisch Blodgett talks with Business Insider’s Nathan McCarron about making women’s sports more financially successful. Kartimbo/BFA
“The revenue wasn’t high enough to really justify building an entire business team, and the business model wasn’t really working,” Tisch Blodgett said of women’s sports.
Tisch Blodgett rose to prominence for founding sports-focused venture capital firm Next 3, which has invested in Gotham FC, TGL’s Los Angeles Golf Club, the Premier League Lacrosse League and lottery site Jackpot.com.
The Gotham FC owner has been involved in sports since she was a child: her family bought half of the NFL’s New York Giants in 1991. The Tisch family runs Loews Corporation, a restaurant and insurance conglomerate worth approximately $22.9 billion.
The Giants won two Super Bowls under Tisch. Tisch Blodgett has equaled the number of championships in her three years of ownership of Gotham FC – although building one isn’t easy.
Build champions by collecting feedback
Tisch Blodgett knows firsthand the challenges women’s sports teams face after taking over Gotham FC in 2023. The New York-based team was so talented that a few months later they won their first championship.
But success on the court didn’t translate into business success. When Tisch Blodgett took over, Gotham FC did not have its own business office and the players shared a training ground with a club team of 16-year-old boys.
Tisch Blodgett said that while Gotham FC “have a great product on the pitch”, “attendances are really low” due to a lack of awareness.
“Obviously, the people who come really like it, but it’s small,” Tisch Blodgett said of Gotham FC’s fan base in 2023.
Tisch Blodgett has since flipped the script. In July, Gotham FC’s sold-out Citi Field in Queens attracted more than 42,000 fans in what she called the largest women’s sporting event ever in New York City.
Gotham FC announced in July that it would call Queens home starting in 2028, a major upgrade to its existing stadium in Harrison, New Jersey, which is difficult to reach by public transportation from New York City.
One of the keys to Gotham FC’s success is collecting feedback. Tisch Blodgett, who ran marketing for fitness giant Peloton before starting Next 3, said learning from fans “makes the whole business smarter” and is crucial to the growth of football clubs.
“Feedback is very important to me—it’s how we run our organization,” Tisch Blodgett said. “After every game, we send out a survey to everyone who participated, basically asking, ‘Did you like it? Would you recommend it to a friend?'”
Tisch Blodgett said Gotham Football Club’s Net Promoter Score, a measure of how likely a customer is to recommend the brand to a friend, is on par with Apple.
“This allows everyone in the organization to understand what we are trying to achieve in a more effective way,” Tisch Blodgett said.