Miami rapper Pitbull (Armando Christian Pérez), signed a 5-year, $6 million deal with Florida International University (FIU) to rename its athletics stadium as "Pitbull Stadium."
This marks the first time an artist has secured naming rights for a college athletics venue.
As part of the deal, Pitbull will host 10 rent-free events per year at the stadium, create an "FIU Anthem," promote FIU through various channels, and his vodka brand Voli 305 will be the preferred brand sold at the venue.
Pitbull will receive other benefits including two reserved suites for home football games, and VIP parking.
The 20,000-seat Pitbull Stadium, formerly FIU Community Stadium and Ricardo Silva Stadium, opened in 1995 and is home to the FIU Panthers football team, which has not had a winning season since 2018.
The partnership includes marketing opportunities between Pitbull and FIU, the only public Division-I institution in Miami, and involves additional partners like Van Wagner College and South Dade Kia.
FIU's athletic director, Scott Carr, views the Pitbull partnership as a unique chance to amplify FIU's brand and benefit from the artist's financial support, considering it program-changing for the university.
The deal aligns with recent trends in college athletics, as the NCAA approved corporate advertisements on football fields. Universities like Kentucky, USC, and Washington have sold naming-rights deals for their stadiums or fields in the last decade.
Sources: Washington Post, NBC News, The Guardian, Fox News, Benzinga, Morning Brew, Messenger-Inquirer, Rolling Stone.
This article was written in collaboration with Generative AI news company Alchemiq.
