Van Wagner Earns Right To Sell Naming Rights For FC Barcelona's Camp Nou Stadium

Van Wagner Sports & Entertainment has "won an agency shootout to sell naming rights for FC Barcelona's refurbished Camp Nou stadium in what's likely to be the world's largest naming rights deal," according to Terry Lefton in this week's SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. Sources said that the deal to put a corporate name "on the 59-year-old home of FC Barcelona" should exceed $30M per year. VWSE's assignment also includes "selling five or six founding partners sponsorship at Camp Nou, along with rights for the entire complex and for a new arena." The refurbishment will "add 6,000 seats to what is already Europe's largest soccer stadium, giving it a capacity of more than 105,000." The upgrades are part of a $680M refurbishment "across FC Barcelona's campus." Van Wagner "hopes to use its newfound FC Barcelona ties as a springboard to more European business." Currently, only around 5% of Van Wagner's revenue "is from offshore." Van Wagner President & CEO Jeff Knapple "hopes to grow that" to 30% (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 5/2 issue).