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Pro Video Gamer Aims To
Build Endemic Clothing Line |
Pro video gamer Jonathan “Fatal1ty” Wendel is profiled by TIME’s Caplan & Coates, who note he has earned “more than $500,000 in prize money and well over $1[M] beyond that in sponsor deals” with computer hardware companies including Creative, XFX, Abit and Zalman. Wendel: “I want to create a Fatal1ty brand that will last.” Caplan & Coates write, SHe’s talking not just mouse pads and motherboards but even apparel. His website touts hoodies embroidered with the Fatal1ty label.” Wendel and other gamers “will claim about $5[M] in royalties” for ’06. Pro gamer Dave Walsh in ’05 launched a “clothing line aimed at gamers” called Kiaeneto, which sold more than $15,000 in T-shirts in the first month online and at gaming centers. Walsh “hopes over the next few years to build a line exclusively for gamers.” Walsh: “I would go to a lot of these competitions, and I’d see people wearing Hurley or Volcom. But those labels are for skaters and snowboarders. There are a lot of people out there who want to represent video gaming.” Also, the all-female Swedish pro gaming team Les Seules “anticipates a new slate of sponsors on the heels of a world tour filmed for an upcoming reality-TV series that has been sold to numerous networks around the world.” The team is already sponsored by headphone manufacturer Sennheiser, which “pays the women to wear the headphones in competition” (
TIME, 2/12 issue).
