Create Music Group-owned digital content material studio Flighthouse Media sees a chance in bringing sports activities media to Gen Z followers, and to make it occur, it’s launching a brand new model: Fieldhouse.
Fieldhouse is “a sports-first, chaos-powered content material model constructed for the following era of followers,” the corporate stated in a press release on Monday (July 28).
What, precisely, does that imply? For one factor, it means content material like “gamified debates” and scorching takes designed to “spark rivalries, ignite group chats, and preserve followers engaged past the sport.”
In different phrases, it’s ESPN for the TikTok era.
“We noticed a transparent hole: conventional sports activities media isn’t resonating with this era,” Flighthouse CEO Ash Stahl stated.
“Gen Z doesn’t simply watch sports activities, they react to it, work together with it, and form the tradition in actual time. Fieldhouse is our tackle the following era of sports activities content material: humorous, quick, deeply on-line, and made for followers who grew up as a lot on TikTok as they did on ESPN.”
Up to now, it appears to be working: Flighthouse says Fieldhouse has already attracted 145,000 followers and 150 million views. Featured company to date have included NFL athletes from the Cowboys and Texans, school stars from USC and UCLA, and cultural icons just like the Harlem Globetrotters and the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders.
Fieldhouse has additionally picked up some early model sponsors, together with SeatGeek and PrizePicks.
“Gen Z doesn’t simply watch sports activities, they react to it, work together with it, and form the tradition in actual time.”
Ash Stahl, Flighthouse Media
Whereas sports activities media could appear outdoors the wheelhouse of a music distribution, rights administration and publishing firm, it does match with its id as an “viewers firm,” as Co-Founder and CEO Jonathan Strauss places it.
“I’ve tried to maintain this philosophy of encouraging our staff members to construct their very own firms inside Create,” he stated in a latest interview. Stahl “has achieved this at a scale we by no means anticipated.”
General, Flighthouse Media boasts 330 million followers and over 1 billion month-to-month views on TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat throughout its manufacturers, which embrace Flighthouse, Retirement Home and Flighthouse Radio.
Create acquired Flighthouse in 2016, when it was a discovery channel on Musical.ly (now TikTok), and folded it into FH Media, which it fashioned in 2023. Create additionally folded viral advertising company VRTCL, which it acquired in 2022, into FH Media. The corporate has created campaigns for manufacturers like Starbucks, Netflix and Beats by Dre.
Per Forbes, main music names like Atlantic Information, Capitol Information, Common Music Group’s Interscope, Island, and Republic labels, and Warner Music Group have been Flighthouse advertising companions.
And in sports activities, Flighthouse sees a chance to develop its viewers – and with it, the potential for model partnerships.
“After what we’ve constructed with Flighthouse, Gen Z’s residence for popular culture and female-driven fandom, and Retirement Home, which proves you may develop previous with out rising up, entering into sports activities felt like a pure subsequent transfer for Flighthouse Media,” Stahl stated.Music Enterprise Worldwide
