With the New England Patriots, Kansas City Chiefs, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Carolina Panthers, four teams have secured the exclusive NFL marketing rights for the German market. ran explains what that means in detail.

Munich – It’s getting serious with the NFL and Germany. Or rather: more and more serious.

On Wednesday night, the biggest football league in the world has now taken the next step towards its first regular season game on German soil.

With the New England Patriots, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Carolina Panthers, no fewer than four franchises received exclusive permission to conduct marketing in Germany.

This marks the end of a process initiated by the league at the beginning of the year. At that time, so-called “International Home Markets” were advertised for which the 32 NFL teams could apply.

The Pats, Bucs, Chiefs and Panthers then drew up detailed plans – and were awarded the contract. As of 1 January 2022, they will be allowed to get started. But what does that mean in concrete terms for the teams and fans?

Fans can look forward to activities

Fans of the popular teams can look forward to increased activities in Germany. The chances of official watch parties, player appearances and football camps have never been greater!

The Patriots, in particular, will try to take advantage of their “German connection”, which they have through players like Sebastian Vollmer, Markus Kuhn and Jakob Johnson. The German market is wide open to them.

“When we talk about international markets, Germany has always had the most passionate American football fans,” said Patriots owner and CEO Robert Kraft. “Since I bought the team in 1994, we’ve worked hard to grow our global fan base.”

“We look forward to interacting with German fans in new and creative ways as part of this NFL initiative and can’t wait to play a game in Germany,” Kraft said.

The same should also apply to the other three teams.

From January, they will be able to enter into partnerships with German sponsors, hire ambassadors for their brand, bring fans and players together on trips to Germany and be allowed to open an office in Germany.

“Home Marketing Area” brings many opportunities

The regulations around the newly won HMA (Home Marketing Area) allow them to do all this.

It designates a geographical area in which NFL teams are entitled to market. This was previously limited to 75 miles around the team’s location. now the NFL is giving its teams the opportunity to also operate abroad.

In addition to Germany, the teams could choose from Brazil, Canada, China, Mexico and the United Kingdom.