The Univ. of Florida's NIL collective Florida Victorious has "concluded it needs to rework its strategy” two years into the NIL era as schools have been "swept up in a pay-for-play arms race,” according to David Whitley of the GAINESVILLE SUN. Florida Victorious CEO Nate Barbera said that its “war chest is somewhere in the top 10 of big-time schools.” But Whitley noted the collective has “about 3,000 members who pay $15 to $250 a month,” which is “about half the subscriber base of Ole Miss," considered an industry leader. Big-school NILs supposedly have $15M to $20M "war chests." Ohio State’s NIL reportedly dished out $13M on talent acquisition, which “prompted Florida Victorious to try to up its game.” The collective has brought in Freddie Wehbe as Dir of Revenue, and his focus is "on corporate donations,” which he sees as the “great untapped source of NIL revenue.” Wehbe has hired two assistants, and their marketing campaign “blitzing the state with billboards, digital ads and social media promotion” began two weeks ago. NIL has become a “murky, largely unregulated paradigm shift that has alienated a lot of fans,” and Florida Victorious also “must differentiate itself from The Gator Collective, UF’s original NIL that pretty much went up in flames.” Every big NIL also has “savvy business people who are attacking NIL in innovative ways” (GAINESVILLE SUN, 3/4).
