Strategy January 30, 2025
Promotional ‘Ted Lasso’ Card From 2014 Kit Sells for Thousands at Auction
The story underscores how print products complement other promotional products – and can even become the star of the show.
Key Takeaways
• Origins & Purpose: Ted Lasso began as an NBC campaign in 2014 to promote Premier League broadcasts, featuring a limited-edition trading card recently sold for nearly $3,000.
• Promotional Strategy: The original campaign included bar kits, T-shirts, scarves and Uber Eats partnerships, engaging fans and newcomers.
• Modern Promotional Trends: The Ted Lasso card’s success highlights the ongoing relevance of physical print products in promotional strategies.
Before he was motivating the players and supporters of the fictional AFC Richmond, the goofy fish-out-of-water “football” coach Ted Lasso was putting the very real Tottenham Hotspur F.C. through the paces at training and learning the lingo of that football (soccer) in the process.
This quick promotional campaign turned out to be the start of Ted Lasso, which of course became a popular sports comedy-drama television series. The early promo campaign, however, was to advertise that NBC had gotten the television rights to the Premier League. It featured Saturday Night Live alum Jason Sudeikis as Lasso to provide some comic relief and hype up the English game for an American audience.
The TV spot was part of the larger campaign. And, significantly for print and promo pros, there was a smaller, less flashy component that didn’t pop up on screens but is now worth thousands at auction: a limited-edition Ted Lasso “rookie” trading card created by Topps.
The card was part of a promotional packet printed in 2014 that also included NBC’s Premier League commentators Rebecca Lowe, Robbie Mustoe and Arlo White. They were given out at bars and promotional events to further excite fans and newcomers alike to the game, according to The Athletic. Fans received “bar kits” that included drinking glasses, T-shirts and that staple of the soccer supporter world – scarves. There was also a partnership with Uber Eats that delivered English breakfasts in fully branded cars.
Years later, though, the standout piece is the trading card, which The Athletic reported sold in July of last year for almost $3,000 at auction.
“I think a lot of the people who were given these free cards just threw them on the ground or were like, ‘What the heck is this?’ and threw them out or discarded them or forgot about them because they were given away for free,” Michael Osacky, a sports collectibles appraiser and president of Baseball in the Attic, told The Athletic. “It was not a big deal.”
Six years before Ted Lasso the show debuted, there was a Ted Lasso Rookie Card‼️
— Buster (@BusterScher) September 5, 2023
In August, 2014, NBC and Topps partnered up for a promotion.
There were a few broadcaster & personality cards and because of the viral “Ted Lasso” Promo - this rare card was included.
Few were… pic.twitter.com/jRLShzprno
It wasn’t a big deal then, but the card, now a rarity, has gained value due to the popularity of the Ted Lasso show. And, like any collectible, the exclusivity and rarity are what drive the price. The Athletic reported that there are currently only six graded 2014 Ted Lasso rookie cards in existence, which it calls “an astoundingly small number considering the hundreds that were originally given away.”
“Lasso was – it’s not like he was short printed – he was just put into the packs at [the same] rate as any of the other players,” Zvee Geffen, who was brand manager at Topps in 2014, told The Athletic. “You hand things out at eight in the morning on a Saturday in a sports bar in New York and not many of them see the light of day.”
Originally, the cards were not the star of the campaign that they would later become. The TV ad is probably what stoked the most conversation. The kits/scarves were the most kept products. Still, what this story underscores is the value – both real and intangible – of print as a complement to promotional products. It is literally a small component, yes, but the value that it’s gained over the last 10 years due to sentimentality and popularity of Ted Lasso shows that items like cards, fliers, stickers and other print products have a place in even the most modern promotional campaign.
Once it became a television phenomenon, Apple TV also blended print and promo together for immersive Ted Lasso experiences like restaurant takeovers, printing signage and other physical media to transform locations into fully branded pop-ups. That is to say nothing of the way it has used apparel.
Other modern promotional companies certainly see the value in print products like cards, as Fanatics, which has positioned itself as one of the marquee brands in sports and entertainment merchandising, acquired Topps’ trading card business in 2022 for $500 million. Fanatics owner Michael Rubin said at the time that the physical print products that Topps specializes in have a special place in the company’s “digital” future.
“With trading cards and collectibles being a significant pillar of our long-term plans to becoming the leading digital sports platform, we are excited to add a leading trading cards company to build out our business,” Rubin said.
At the time, Rubin was alluding to the then-popularity of NFTs, but just as a physical card can complement a digital trading card, the story of the Ted Lasso card shows how well a physical print product can complement other physical merchandise and even digital media.
And, when done well, it can become much more valuable than the original distributor ever dreamed of.