Strong apparel sales should help the NBA continue the success it achieved in what it said was a record fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30. NBAstore.com sales were up 13% for that year, while team-controlled retail sales showed a 6% sales increase. Those numbers were buoyed by LeBron James, long the league’s top-selling player, joining the Los Angeles Lakers before last season. First-time title teams are also usually good sales stories, and the Toronto Raptors set a sales record for their first day as NBA champions in June at league-controlled e-commerce outlets.
James and Golden State’s Stephen Curry continue to pace jersey sales, while the Lakers, Warriors and Raptors were the top-selling teams for the fiscal year.
Panini
This season, there’s nothing as powerful as James switching teams to boost sales. However, the Los Angeles Clippers have seen sales rocket after they added NBA Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard and All-Star Paul George. Likewise, Brooklyn’s signings of Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant have juiced sales of Nets apparel. Specific figures were not made available.
Houston and Golden State will be showcasing new uniform looks and identity packages for their base uniform from Nike; 12 teams will unveil “Classic Edition” unis; 14 will have new “Statement Edition” on-court togs; and 29 will show new “City Edition” uniforms in November (Memphis is the only team not included), said Brian Keegan, the league’s vice president of retail partnerships.
No. 1 draft pick Zion Williamson will be playing in New Orleans, one of the league’s smallest markets, so it will be interesting to track his influence on both sneaker and apparel sales. He’s already roiling the trading-card market for exclusive NBA licensee Panini — some of the first cards issued by that company that showed Williamson in a Duke uniform had asking prices of $10,000 and up on eBay last week, leading to speculation about how much his forthcoming rookie card in a Pelicans uniform could fetch.
“We haven’t seen this level of excitement for a rookie since LeBron’s rookie year [2003-2004],” said Jason Howarth, Panini America vice president of marketing.
