- Two U.S. internationals at San Siro
- Have built audience in the States
- Duo will not stick around forever
WHAT HAPPENED?
American interest in the Rossoneri has piqued courtesy of transfer deals for star forward Pulisic and all-action midfielder Yunus Musah. A recent study by the Men In Blazers network revealed that 61 per cent of soccer fans in the States are now “much more interested” or “somewhat more interested in Milan since they acquired two U.S. internationals.
WHAT OETTLE SAID
Performances on the field have helped to retain those supporters – with Pulisic posting a personal-best goal return of 15 efforts in 2023-24 – and Milan’s chief commercial officer, Maikel Oettle, has told The Athletic of a boom over the Atlantic: “A local hero makes a massive difference. I’m German, I played tennis all my life, probably thanks to Boris Becker. But there is no turnkey solution of signing one player and then tomorrow, without doing anything, you will have incredible results. It’s more of a compound effect of doing the right thing continuously. One of these right things is definitely leveraging people like Christian and Yunus in our communication and the way we push our merchandise. At the end of our first season with those two, the U.S. is now by far our second-biggest market in terms of e-commerce and the revenue and volumes of orders that we’re getting. We’re roughly 130 per cent up in terms of volume that is coming out of the U.S. versus last year, which to a big extent is the result of Christian having a killer breakout season at AC Milan and also Yunus doing really well.”
THE BIGGER PICTURE
The question now is, how do Milan avoid losing that fanbase when the likes of Pulisic and Musah move on? Oettle added: “You see this in other sports too. You have the LeBrons that cause exactly the same (in that a fan might have followed NBA star LeBron James when he moved teams). Let’s say with Christian, we need to make sure we stay relevant enough that we remain sticky once the player leaves. A local hero is a great tool for fan acquisition but you must stay fresh… and be at the intersection of sports, entertainment and culture, tapping into the worlds of fashion, music, gaming, trying to diversify your brand as much as possible in the different interest fields of those young fans because they are indeed very fickle. Today they play Fortnite, tomorrow they watch AC Milan, and the day after they are following the NBA finals and so on.”
WHAT NEXT?
Milan have Pulisic tied to a contract through to 2027. He is currently away on international duty at the 2024 Copa America and will need to step up for an expectant fanbase again when the USMNT return to action on Monday against Uruguay with a place in the quarter-finals of a major international tournament up for grabs.
