WNBA Seattle Storm’s CFO says ticket gross sales greater than doubled regardless of inflation

Whereas on the street, McLean is dealing with funds and rooting for the group. She confirmed me the necklace she wears with the Storms’ WBNA championship rings. “I’ve three out of 4,” she explains. “Once we gained the championship in 2002, I wasn’t but with the group. I put on these for good luck through the playoffs.”

Courtesy of Seattle Storm

McLean joined the Storm in 2008 as VP of finance and HR. She was promoted to CFO in 2019. Since becoming a member of the group, she’s seen the enterprise develop. “We’ve grown over 250% this yr in income from our prime quantity since I’ve been right here,” she says. “We have now 35 full-time, year-round workers. Then we now have the 12 gamers. After which, we go as much as about 100 folks through the season for all our recreation nights. That features our dance troupe, IT folks, and others.”

She says that ticket gross sales, company partnerships and merchandise are the three most important income streams. “We actually turned to on-line gross sales through the pandemic,” she says. “We used to promote about $150,000 price of merchandise a yr, which then changed into half 1,000,000 {dollars} price of merchandise. We’ve saved our on-line gross sales as a result of we now have so many extra followers. We’ll do over 1,000,000 {dollars} in merchandise income this yr. And that’s because of the reputation of ladies’s sports activities and the WNBA particularly.

“After which we now have some TV income from ESPN,” she says. “And that’s by means of the league. That’s the recreation changer that we’re actually searching for—to be paid for tv broadcasts.”

The Storm didn’t have a everlasting dwelling for 3 seasons whereas the Local weather Pledge Space was below building. The group had its season opener in Might at the arena. “This yr, once we re-entered our dwelling in Seattle, and we greater than doubled our ticket gross sales,” McLean says.

As a CFO, I requested McLean if inflationary pressure was one among her prime issues. “I suppose I’d be involved if folks stop spending their {dollars} on leisure,” she says. “However that has not confirmed to be the case for us in any respect. We have now nice renewal. The followers are there as a result of they care about our group and the [win]. When the pandemic occurred, 90% of our season ticket holders left their cash with the Storm; they didn’t ask for a refund. The Storm and the league “have nice momentum proper now,” she says. “And if we will get TV to be the place we’d like it to be, that would be the subsequent degree of development I’m searching for.”

It appears that evidently being a CFO within the WNBA is a tricky job. The league makes a whole lot of troublesome selections as a result of budgets are tight in comparison with different skilled sports activities. I requested McLean how she’s navigated this dynamic.

“It may be onerous,” she explains. “The athletes need sure issues, deserve sure issues that we will’t at all times afford. However we’re owned by three women. Two of them had been skilled athletes; one was a silver medalist. So that they consider on this mission and wish to present for these gamers greater than anybody. We’re lastly making fairly good cash, and so they’re nonetheless persevering with to place it again into the group.”

She continues, “They’re constructing a state-of-the-art apply facility proper now for our athletes, which I consider would be the first within the nation constructed by girls and financed by girls for girls.”

See you tomorrow.

Sheryl Estrada
[email protected]

Upcoming occasion: In case you are a CFO within the Chicago space, be part of us at Sepia on September 22 for our CFO Collaborative in-depth dinner dialog. The subject of debate: The Finance Expertise Mannequin of the Future. I will likely be joined by Fortune CEO Alan Murray, Fortune Finance Editor Lee Clifford, and Clem Johnson, President, Crist|Kolder Associates. Click here for more information and to apply. Please observe that attendance is complimentary and topic to approval.

Huge deal

KPMG LLP’s annual report, “Tax Reimagined 2022: Perspectives from the C-suite,” finds that tax professionals are in a time of transformation as a result of tech developments and the complexity of the U.S. and world tax regulatory panorama. Though there’s some progress from final yr, 52% of C-suite executives usually are not leveraging tax information for state of affairs planning round tax coverage adjustments. In 2022, 68% of executives usually are not leveraging tax information to align with ESG priorities; that is a rise from 55% in 2021. Accounting stays a central competency for tax professionals. Nonetheless, in 2022, C-suite executives ranked coding as essentially the most wanted talent, in response to the report. The survey additionally discovered that 83% of respondents agreed that their group sees extra girls candidates and hires as tax professionals than in earlier years. And 72% agreed their group sees extra candidates and hires from underrepresented teams than in earlier years. The findings are primarily based on a survey of 300 C-suite executives at organizations with $1 billion or extra in income. 

Courtesy of KPMG

Going deeper

“Freelance, aspect hustles, and gigs: Many extra People have turn into impartial staff,” a McKinsey & Company report, factors to “a seismic shift” in how People work and assist themselves. McKinsey’s American Alternative Survey discovered that 36% of employed respondents—equal to 58 million People—establish as impartial staff. This share is up from McKinsey’s estimate of 27% in 2016.

Leaderboard

Dominik Asam was named CFO at SAP SE (NYSE: SAP), efficient March 7, 2023. As beforehand introduced, after 26 years with the corporate, Luka Mucic, presently CFO, is stepping down. He’ll stay an SAP SE Government Board member till March 31, 2023. Asam involves SAP from Airbus, a Munich-based Infineon Applied sciences AG, the place he has been CFO since 2011. Along with his new CFO position, Asam will turn into a member of the Government Board of SAP SE.

Amanda Blum was named CFO at Lynx Software Technologies, a developer of open structure software program options. Blum was beforehand with Inexperienced Hills Software program, a supplier of embedded security and safety options, the place she served as the company controller. Previous to becoming a member of Inexperienced Hills, Blum held a number of senior monetary and accounting positions at Sientra, Inc., a publicly traded medical system firm. She is a licensed public accountant.

Overheard

“The present superbubble options an unprecedentedly harmful mixture of cross-asset overvaluation (with bonds, housing, and shares all critically overpriced and now quickly dropping momentum), commodity shock, and Fed hawkishness. Every cycle is totally different and distinctive—however each historic parallel means that the worst is but to come back.”

—Wall Avenue veteran Jeremy Grantham, the cofounder of Boston asset supervisor GMO, argued in a Wednesday analysis observe that regardless of the inventory market’s struggles this yr, the economic system’s actual downturn hasn’t but come. Grantham is well-known for having predicted Japan’s asset value bubble within the Nineteen Eighties and the dot-com bubble of the late ’90s, Fortune reported.

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