Fanatics has signed a deal under which for the next 14 years, it will operate the new NBA Store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan scheduled to open this fall. The league signed a 20-year lease for 25,000 square feet of retail space at 45th St. and Fifth Ave. earlier this year. Fanatics also operates the NBA’s e-commerce site and is promising an omni-channel shopping experience, with customers in the planned store able to buy anything from the site via handheld devices. Also promised for the new store are a dedicated area for customizing licensed products, a concierge service offering personalized shopping and a 3,000-square-foot event space.
The deal continues Fanatics’ brick-and-mortar expansion, which has seen the company pick up NASCAR at-track retail rights, in addition to its 15 venue operations across college and pro sports facilities. Outgoing uniform rights holder adidas operated the current NBA Store, which is the league’s second branded retail location. The new NBA emporium will have three levels and be more than four times larger than the NBA Store that the league opened four years ago three blocks north on Fifth Avenue. That retail location, which league officials have been calling “temporary” since it opened in October '11, will be shuttered in August when its lease expires.
