Interview: The Wall Street veteran turning Venezia FC into a global brand
IMAGO | Former CEO of the New York stock exchange and current president of Venezia FC, Duncan Niederauer.
Former CEO of the New York stock exchange Duncan Niederauer bought Venezia FC in 2020 and won promotion to Serie A within a year.
In an exclusive interview he talks about how the club is working to find a balance between sporting success and long-term sustainability and how Italian football needs to change to make it competitive again.
Venezia FC's branding has a unique, high-end look that melds the culture, history, and art of Venice with sport. The club now generate 95 per cent of merchandise sales from outside Italy.
Why it matters: There has been a deluge of US investment in European football in the past five years, but few clubs have developed such a distinctive niche as Niederauer’s Venezia.
The perspective: Niederauer says that Italy has yet to realize that if you share revenue more equitably and create a bit more competition “history is now more and more replete with examples where the pie just gets enormously large”.
28 August 2023 - 3:18 PM
When you click on Venezia FC’s website, it is to be taken into a place far away from the world of Italy’s second tier – the division where the club currently reside.
What do you see? There is the Grand Canal filling half of your screen. There is a female model artfully photographed, as if from a glossy magazine. An image of the Venice Republic’s flag flapping in the wind. Male and female footballers celebrating, their badges obscured.
It might be a high-end travel web
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