Sport Beach Adobe Summit 2026

NO HOME FIELD ADVANTAGE: BUILDING FANBASES FROM SCRATCH

Abstract: Global reach is easy. Cultural trust is not. As markets become saturated, the next decade of growth for every major brand runs through expansion to new cities and countries – a true blue-sky opportunity if done right. But global expansion has a graveyard of cautionary tales -  because simply showing up isn't a winning strategy.


The challenge is cultural physics. Some sports identities are so fused to place that globalization feels near impossible. The Premier League is English. Cricket is the subcontinent. Football is American. Yet properties that crack the global code largely do it through fans who will never watch a game live or in the same time zone. How do you communalize this borderless fandom?


The answer lies in building something new markets can claim as their own, without severing ties to the original. New traditions. Local meaning. Global belonging. How far can a sports' soul travel, and how much has to be grown fresh wherever it lands?


This panel examines the harder discipline: identifying markets with genuine conversion potential, what it costs to move a population from aware to invested, and how you build cultural trust that turns a foreign property into a local institution.


SEO: How do sports properties build global fanbases from scratch? Explore strategies for cultural expansion, local brand adaptation, and converting new markets into loyal audiences.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

1. Explore what every brand can steal from the sports playbook when it comes to engaging fans who will never walk into a store or experience your product in community.
2. Discover why the properties winning globally are the most creative with their brand — and how to know how far you can bend local brand expression before you break the connection to the original
3. Learn how sports franchises diagnose whether a new market has genuine conversion potential or just surface-level interest — and apply that discipline to your own global expansion strategy before it costs you

PANELISTS

1. Aiden Lyons, Williams
2. Tony Parker, fmr NBA
3. Israel Garcia, Real Madrid
4. BLS

BEYOND THE BANDWAGON: LOYALTY THAT OUTLASTS THE BIG MOMENT

Abstract: Inherited fandom was self-healing. Today’s fan is fickle. Lose a season, lose a superstar, go through a decade of mediocrity — the fan who grew up in the culture of a team came back anyway, because leaving meant losing part of their identity. But new fan architectures don't come pre-loaded with forgiveness.


Which makes the bandwagon problem existential. When fandom is built on a winning streak, a fantasy team run, or an athlete’s affiliation, the slump isn't just a rough patch — it's a churn event. The question for every sports property, and every brand operating in this space, is how you create immersive culture to convert the fan who showed up for the peak into someone who stays for the valley.

The answer is what you give fans to hold onto in between — the rituals, players, community, and identity that make leaving feel like a loss. This panel examines how leagues, teams, and athletes engineer fan stickiness, and what every brand leader can take from it: give people something to belong to, not just something to buy into.


SEO: How do sports teams convert fair-weather fans into lifers? Discover strategies for building brand loyalty, community, and identity that retains customers long after the big moments.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

1. Explore how sports properties convert peak-moment fans into lifelong loyalists — and what every brand leader can learn about turning a first-time buyer into a true advocate
2. Discover why the teams and athletes with the most durable fanbases invest in the in-between — the rituals, community, and identity that exist independently of the scoreboard
3. Learn how to diagnose the difference between a customer who buys into your peak and one who belongs to your world, and what it actually takes to convert one into the other

PANELIST FRAMEWORK

1. Tyrese Haliburton, Indiana Pacers
2. Bryan Strauss, Golden State Warriors
3. TBD
4. BLS

BIGGER THAN THE JERSEY: WHY THE ATHLETE'S WORLD IS A LEAGUE'S GREATEST ASSET

Abstract: A jersey can be traded, a contract can expire, a career can end. But the worlds the best athletes build around their personal brands? Those travel, compound, and sometimes outlast everything else.


When an athlete builds a brand with genuine texture — a point of view, a community, an identity independent of their team — they stop being a roster asset and become a universe of their own. That world moves with them when they're traded, sustains them through slumps, and survives retirement in a way that on-field legacy alone can’t.


The smartest teams and leagues have stopped seeing this as a threat and started seeing it as infrastructure. Every audience an athlete brings into their personal universe is a potential entry point into the broader team and league ecosystem. Helmets-off brand building doesn't dilute the sport's world — it expands it.


This panel examines how athletes construct brands that outlast the game, why teams and leagues are learning to encourage it, and why the most enduring sports worlds are built around the people inside them — not just the product on the field.


SEO: How do athletes build personal brands that outlast their careers — and why do teams and leagues encourage it? Explore the symbiotic relationship between athlete and franchise brand building.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

1. Explore how teams and leagues are turning athlete personal brands into audience acquisition infrastructure — and how smart organizations think about empowering individuals to expand the overall ecosystem
2. Learn why the teams and leagues winning at world-building are the ones treating athlete identity as an expansion strategy, not a PR risk — and what that calculus looks like for any organization with powerful individuals inside it.
3. Discover why the athletes with the most durable brands are the ones who built a world before they needed one — and what that pre-emptive approach to identity building means for any brand that wants to survive its own off-season

PANELIST FRAMEWORK

1. Justin Jefferson
2. Kirby Porter, CMO, Unrivaled
3. TBD - PepsiCo
4. BLS