RCB's ₹580 Cr masterstroke 🏏💰
4th most valued IPL team despite losing every year.
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The RCB Magic ✨
RCB got knocked out yesterday but despite that, it is the 4th most-valued club after M. Indians, KKR, & CSK. It made ₹280 Cr. in revenue last year & has become a ₹580 Cr. global lifestyle brand instead of a sports brand. So what have they cracked really?
But first, how does an IPL team make money?
There are 5 major ways an IPL club makes money.
Central Rights - BCCI sells the holistic IPL rights for Media & Broadcasting rights & Central Sponsorships — the BIGGEST source for every club. BCCI keeps 50% for itself, divides 45% equally among teams & keeps 5% for the winning teams.
Prize Money - The money BCCI keeps for the top 4 teams. Last year, the total purse size was ₹46.5 Cr - yes you read that right.
Team Sponsorship - The money you get after selling spaces on kits & jerseys.
Ticket & Merch Sales - The club & BCCI share this in an 80/20 split.
Royalty, License, Transfers & others - smallest source.
What did The RCB crack then? 🤯
The association game.
See RCB understands the marketing principle of “association”. This principle works well for every brand— players are no longer just athletes but stars who bring a lot of ticket sales, merch sales & social media hype. In fact, most of the hype of CSK is because of the legend, MS Dhoni.
RCB has been bullish on getting star players like Chris Gayle, Ab De Villers, & Virat Kohli since the start. The magic is not only getting big players but also retaining them. The idea is simple: Get Star Players → Increase Perceived Value → Get More Fans → Retain Players → Compound Brand Loyalty.
The reason RCB is the 6 biggest sports club (worldwide) in social media engagement. Btw, Virat is the 3rd most followed athlete in the world, so can’t forget the audience he brings alone.
The offline game.
Vijay Mallya knew that this club was a right fit for his alcohol company, USL. He wanted RCB to become a lifestyle brand and not a boring sports club — spent a ton on hosting IPL parties & bringing glamour. Over time, the marketing team of RCB became more serious about investing in offline experiences.
They do it all—
Start studded pre-tournament event “RCB UNBOX”
Premium Chinnaswamy stadium experience
Top-notch RCB cafes for creating cult
Hall of Fame events for club legends
No other IPL team invests this much in the offline setups as much as RCB does— the reason why their fans don’t stop loving them despite the heavy match losses.
The content game.
IPL happens once in a year. So how does RCB stay relevant throughout the year? The answer lies in their viral content campaigns.They partner with the smartest agencies to stay updated. If podcasts are trending, they do more podcasts— like the RCB Insider podcast with comedian Danish Sait is loved by the fans.
Be it Kohli breaking a record or India playing in the World Cup, they create the MOST viral content for their Instagram audience of ~1.5 Crore people.
Constantly engage with fans → Entertain them → Give value → Keep the craze alive.
That’s not all, we did a GrowthX Wireframe on RCB, where we covered this in-depth.
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