SBJ: Direct-to-consumer platform Sport & Story looks to change digital content for college athletic departments
Sport & Story is the Direct-to-Consumer production company behind it all, although the business should technically be reclassified as Direct-to-College Fanatic. Capitalizing on the notion that university fanbases are the most rabid on earth and starving for any morsel of content, Sport & Story has the technology and story-telling acumen to satisfy them all.
The company’s newly-elevated president Victor Vitarelli, who formerly led the prestigious ESPN features unit, says Sport & Story initially described itself to Arkansas as “a mini-Netflix’’ that could house Video-on-Demand content on all of the Razorback teams, players and coaches. What’s played out since -- culminating with tonight’s documentary that airs at 7 p.m. CT-- is a blueprint for how athletic departments can use apps, streams, podcasts, memberships and daily emails to drive revenue, recruiting and NIL.
“Our business model kind of makes it a bit of a no-brainer,’’ Vitarelli says.
In other words, Sport & Story fashions itself as a behind-the-scenes university partner who—in return for media access to a school’s athletic department and the ability to charge $7.99 a month to its fans—takes on all of the production expense. The end results are in-depth films and feature stories on athletes from every sport, whether it’s as non-revenue as swimming and lacrosse or as money-bingeing as football and men’s basketball.