Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Discover Financial Services is facing gender and age bias claims, Melania Trump teases her memoir coming out this fall, and Erin Andrews’s sports apparel brand is ready for the new NFL season.
- Game time. During last night's NFL season opener, Erin Andrews watched as her brand was back—if not quite where it all began, where things changed for the line last year. The longtime Fox sports reporter is also the founder of Wear by Erin Andrews, a line of sports-themed women's apparel—one that Taylor Swift repeatedly sported while supporting Travis Kelce at Kansas City Chiefs games last year.
It just so happened that the Chiefs played the Ravens to kick off this year's NFL season, with the Chiefs winning 27-20. And although Swift showed up this time dressed more like a pop star in a Versace denim bustier than a casual football fan, the impact of her support for the brand was clear throughout Arrowhead Stadium. "It's so awesome to walk into stadiums and see women wearing your gear," Andrews says.
Andrews's brand has spent the off-season preparing for round two of the Swiftie NFL season. Unsurprisingly, the items Swift wore at games, like a $129 Chiefs windbreaker, immediately sold out last season. But as much as Swifties have adopted the Chiefs as their team, plenty of Swift fans were already committed NFL fans with teams of their own. The Swift bump extended to other teams' versions of the same items of clothing. "Swifties aren't just Chiefs fans. They're Miami Dolphins fans. They're Green Bay Packers fans," Andrews says.
Andrews launched Wear by EA in 2019 after a 20-year career in sports, during which she often noticed that none of the team apparel sold at stadiums appealed to her. It was just men's apparel in smaller sizes, and she preferred a more feminine—but casual—look. "There was so much for men, but only a few styles for women. What was available for women was still the same stuff I was seeing in college when I would buy stuff from Pink," she says, remembering the NFL apparel sold at the Victoria's Secret offshoot. "There was a huge white space, but it took forever for people to listen to us—four or five years of pitching it." Her brand created team jackets, shirts, bags and jewelry in partnership with BaubleBar specifically for women. The brand is sold via Fanatics and in team stores.
Andrews has spent her career as one of the most visible reporters in men's sports. So as she built the brand, she's been focused on the leagues she knows: NFL, MLB, NHL, and the NBA. Wear recently launched college sports apparel—a way into the world of women's sports fandom.
"They're two different worlds that we're seeing," Andrews says of the parallel rise of women's sports and her efforts to bring more women into men's sports. "But I think women like myself can help."
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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