North America’s largest fan merchandise company, Fanatics, has launched a new NFT (non-fungible token) service known as Candy Digital to leverage its wide range of sports collectibles and major league licenses.
Fanatics describes Candy Candy Digital (www.candy.com) as a “next generation digital collectible company” that is entering the NFT space with three of the world’s most innovative companies across sports, e-commerce, technology, collectibles and cryptocurrency, along with an exclusive long-term agreement with its first content partner, Major League Baseball (MLB).
“At its core, Candy is about allowing everyone to own a piece of their passion—whether that be sports or gaming, fashion or art, music or pop culture, the goal is to broaden the fanbase of digital collectibles,” said Michael Rubin, Executive Chairman of Fanatics and Co-Chair of Candy Digital. “Both Candy and our pioneering partner Major League Baseball live at the intersection of passion, community, innovation, and digital transformation—the sweet spot.”
The Candy Digital service is being launched as a partnership between Fanatics’ executive chair Michael Rubin; Mike Novogratz, the founder and CEO of Galaxy Digital; and Gary Vaynerchuk, a serial entrepreneur and investor.
“Leveraging deep experience in sports, e-commerce, fintech, blockchain, pop culture and digital media, the founders and their respective companies have positioned Candy to enter the digital asset marketplace with significant resources, skills, and capabilities,” Fanatics said in a statement.
“Fanatics, a global leader for licensed sports merchandise and memorabilia, will introduce its 80-plus million consumers to a new way of enjoying their favorite teams, players and sports moments. Galaxy Digital will provide its incredible knowledge of the digital asset, cryptocurrency and blockchain technology space, and Gary Vaynerchuk will lend his preeminent digital, social media and collectibles experience to the company.”
However, Fanatics will be the majority owner of the new company, and says Candy is already building Major League Baseball’s official NFT ecosystem where fans and collectors will be able to purchase, trade and share officially licensed NFTs to deepen their love of the sport. Candy now has a team of world-class digital artists, designers and technologists in place, who are now developing a broad range of digital collectibles, beginning with sports content and expanding into art, entertainment, music and more.
Candy’s NFTs will be available on its online platform where fans will be able to purchase, collect, view, and trade via a branded storefront and secondary marketplace. Fans can sign up to receive the latest information and updates at www.candy.com.
Candy and Major League Baseball’s first release is a 1-of-1 NFT of Lou Gehrig’s famous Luckiest Man speech that he delivered on July 4, 1939, after being diagnosed with ALS. This NFT was issued to commemorate the league’s first official Lou Gehrig Day which took place June 2 to raise awareness and funds to fight ALS, which is also called Lou Gehrig’s Disease. Proceeds from the sale of the NFT, which is scheduled to be released on the July 4 weekend, will support ALS charities.
Novogratz, Founder and CEO of Galaxy Digital and Co-Chair of Candy Digital says NFTs are the wave of the future for collectibles. “NFTs are fundamentally changing how we think about owning cultural artifacts,” he says. “We’re in the very early stages of this transformation and Candy’s focus on creativity, community and authenticity will all play a key role in its success in defining this new market.”
In launching alongside MLB, the company is also partnering with the ideal league whose fanbase craves memorabilia and the rich tradition for producing some of the most memorable highlights across all sports.
Like many other sports organization, the MLB has obviously looked at the National Basketball Association’s success in launching NBA Top Shots, which is another NFT collectible program launched earlier this year. The NBA partnered with Canadian-based Dapper Labs, who are renowned in the NFT world as the makers of the CryptoKitties NFTs, which many say was the first real NFT program.
According to Dapper Labs, by March Top Shots had generated more than $230 million in sales, but it’s worth noting that most of that did not go to the NBA or to Dapper Labs. Instead, most of that value was ascribed to traders exchanging the collectibles after their initial sale. In one such transaction, a video highlight featuring LeBron James sold for $200,000. Dapper earns revenue via fees captured from peer-to-peer transactions and unleashing new packs of NFTs.
That kind of demand and the soaring values of NFTs in 2020 to 2021 has caused a land rush of sorts for companies involved either in the fine art business or in collectibles, including trading cards, comic books, and digital collectibles within video games, for example. Candy Digital hopes to take a leading role in this new facet of the industry, says Vaynerchuk.
“As a lifetime collector myself, I couldn’t be more excited for what this partnership means for both creators and consumers, especially the uber-passionate MLB community who craves collectibles and celebrating the iconic moments that makes this game so special,” he said. “We’re at the forefront of a massive technology shift and Candy will be at the center.”
Following the Lou Gehrig NFT release, additional digital assets will be rolled out to MLB’s loyal fan base as the company looks to broaden the current and future demand in this new medium.
“From trading cards to autographed balls, baseball fans have demonstrated their passion for the sport and its players through collectibles for decades,” said Robert D. Manfred, Jr., Commissioner of Baseball. “In working with Candy Digital to offer NFTs to MLB fans, we’re delivering an exciting new addition to the robust baseball collectible market. The founders of Candy are a dynamic group of executives with an impressive track record. We’re excited to be the first partner in this new venture with a team uniquely positioned for success.”
Candy intends to utilize a new NFT ecosystem developed on Ethereum as its core blockchain technology. Featuring low gas costs, fast transaction finality, and 99% more energy efficiency than proof of work systems, this system is designed from the ground up to be a secure, scalable, and sustainable infrastructure to host Candy’s offerings.