The Qatar World Cup winning team will receive $44 million of the $440 million in prize money paid by FIFA.
Business is rarely so simple. If you produce a product that everyone wants to buy, but it costs you almost nothing to produce, you will accumulate a lot of money pretty quickly.
In a nutshell, this is how FIFA, the world governing body for football, makes money.
In 2018, when the World Cup was held in Russia, FIFA made more than $4.6 billion in revenue.
FIFA pays the host country’s World Cup organizing committees, bonuses, travel and accommodation costs for the teams and support staff, plus a legacy fund to help develop the sport in the host country. home after the World Cup circus left the city.
The Qatar World Cup winning team will receive $44 million of the $440 million prize pool, paid by FIFA.
FIFA organizes its accounts on a four-year cycle around each World Cup. For the most recently announced 2015-18 cycle, FIFA brought in $6.4 billion. 2021, a year without the World Cup, FIFA grossed 766 million USD.
TV rights
Most of FIFA’s income comes from the sale of television rights to the World Cup and other international tournaments.
Of the $6.4 billion generated in the previous cycle, $4.6 billion came from television rights.
marketing rights
Global brands pay FIFA for the right to advertise at the organization’s events. The biggest brands partner with FIFA on development and social responsibility plans, which means they have access to FIFA’s non-profit division, which invests in the sport of football at the international level. , country and grassroots level.
The next big brands are allowed to advertise at the World Cup, the most watched televised event on the planet. About five billion people, more than half of Earth’s population, are expected to watch this year’s tournament. It’s a great audience to sell things for.
In the pre-World Cup 2018 cycle, marketing rights deals brought in $1.66 billion for FIFA. And even in 2021, revenue from the sale of marketing rights amounts to $131 million.
Ticket sales and entertainment
Another monetization engine for FIFA is portal revenue. All income from ticketing rights goes to a wholly owned subsidiary of FIFA. In the 2015-18 cycle, this brought in $712 million.
In 2021, ticket sales for the Arab Cup, when about 600,000 people attended, generated about $12 million. About three million tickets to watch Qatar 2022 have been sold. And with prices ranging from $100 to $1,100, this is sure to be another bountiful year.
Branding and Licensing
FIFA also collects money through licensing its brands. The most famous of these is Electronic Arts’ FIFA soccer game series, which is said to have generated $20 billion in revenue for EA during its 20-year partnership with FIFA.
The game maker is said to have paid FIFA in the region $150 million annually for the rights to use the FIFA name.
In 2021, FIFA made $180 million from licensing its brands for merchandise, retail, and games. That same year, FIFA received a $201 million award from the US Department of Justice for damages for corruption after dozens of top FIFA executives were indicted in 2015.
