For Tottenham Hotspur, moving to a new stadium back in 2019 was a move that it was felt was required in order for the club to keep pace with their ‘big six’ rivals.
Leaving White Hart Lane for the 62,850-seater Tottenham Hotspur Stadium may have been a wrench from a sentimental point of view, but the ability for the club to drive matchday revenues beyond £100million per season, and for commercial revenue to rise by 237% since the last full season of financials at the old ground.
Commercial revenue for Spurs, according to the recently-published Deloitte Football Money League report, stands at a club-record £256million, still above the likes of Chelsea and Arsenal, although the Gunners leapfrogged Tottenham thanks to a return to Champions League football.
While the goal for long-term growth very much has to have competitive success as part of it, Spurs’ stadium play means that they are in a strong financial position, and it's one they want to continue to see improve.
With broadcast rights starting to show some signs of stagnation, club owners know that they cannot rely on the boom-time of the 2010s, where the rights shot up each cycle. There is a limit to what broadcasters will be willing to pay due to a squeeze on funds in the face of the rise of piracy and loss of subscribers.
Stadium income is something clubs are targeting heavily, either through redevelopment or starting afresh. Spurs’ ability to do that allowed them to create a home from home for the NFL in London.
To have such a world-class stadium in London is something that has huge value potential for Spurs, and hosting other events outside of the football calendar forms part of the grand plan to keep commercial revenue moving in the right direction.
In 2023, one of the world’s biggest musical artists, Beyonce, played five nights at Spurs’ home. It was part of the highest-grossing tour for a female artist in history. The sell-out nights were a huge success and showcased what Spurs’ home had to offer away from football, with such success ultimately aiding the club’s bottom line and its ability to invest into the product that goes on the pitch.
"It’s a really competitive market," said Donna-Marie Cullen, executive director at Spurs, speaking at the Financial Times Business of Football Summit in London last year, where football.london was present.
"Venues tend to have their own sweet spot. So, Wembley, if you are Taylor Swift you know that you will sell out two nights, so you’ll probably do Wembley. Beyonce probably could’ve done that but she preferred to do five nights, she preferred the more intimate setting that our stadium gives.
“In fact, that turned out to be the highest-grossing concert ever for any female artist. She made £42.5m for five nights at the stadium."
The success of hosting concerts and other events leads to the requirement for other ancillary development, with a hotel soon to be built at the stadium. That is something which will, again, add to the bottom line.
"Beyonce was a bit of a tipping point, actually," said Cullen. "The stadium operates a bit of a sweet spot in the market in terms of the size and how you can construct it for concerts, so we do boxing, we do concerts, rugby, NFL, visitor attractions, conferences, and events and we are about to start building a hotel.”
Beyonce returns this summer. The 43-year-old singer had initially planned four dates on June 5, 7, 10 and 12, but has now added two more dates on June 14 and 16 to make it a six-night run, with the success of the 2023 tour a huge part of that.
Also playing at the stadium this summer will be rapper Kendrick Lamar, who dominated the headlines on Sunday as he took to the stage as the main act for the Super Bowl’s halftime show in New Orleans.
He and singer SZA, who joined him at the weekend, will take in one night at Spurs on July 22 as part of their global ‘Grand National Tour’. It, like Beyonce’s dates, is expected to be a sell out, and Tottenham will reap the benefits of a summer of live music when it comes to commercial income.
What usually happens when stadiums are selected as part of arena tours is that the owners of the stadium will be paid a rental fee for its use by the tour promoters.
What then happens is a running total for the club throughout the evening, as merchandise sales and ticket sales, as well as clubs being able to, often, upsell for such things as hospitality to generate more revenue. To use the average, Liverpool stood to make more than £1million per evening from the sale of Taylor Swift merchandise during her three-night run at Anfield last summer.
According to estimates, Swift’s three nights at Anfield secured Liverpool between £7million and £10million. To use the additional capacity at Spurs, a conservative estimate for Spurs for six sell-out nights for Beyonce and one for Kendrick Lamar could be placed at around £12million to £15million, potentially more, and that during the summer at a time when there is low cash flow for clubs owing to a lack of matchday revenue, which for Spurs is often around £4.9million per game as an average, the highest in the Premier League and a major miss when games aren’t played at the stadium. It is why putting it to extra use is absolutely vital.
Other benefits for the club include the additional exposure that the stadium and team might get from hosting famous names, and that is something that could have an impact on the club in their bid to get a partner willing to pay what chairman Daniel Levy feels is fair for the naming rights to the stadium. To be able to host world-class artists as well as football and the NFL means that Spurs should be able to charge a lot more than most.
This summer looks set to be one of significant spend on the player recruitment front, and it also looks like being a banner year in terms of driving commercial revenues from making the most of what the stadium has to offer, and that is why Spurs have become the blueprint for what other European clubs want to achieve from their own stadia.