The 2022 MLB season saw the league take baseball audiences’ changing appetites to heart–as reflected in a groundbreaking new sponsorship category and restructured longtime sponsorship agreements.
MLB’s landmark approval of CBD sponsorships for teams last June–and the league’s own deal with CBD brand Charlotte’s Web to become MLB’s first-ever CBD sponsor, inked this month–underscores its groundbreaking efforts to cater to fans’ evolving tastes and further expand its fan base, a progressive approach that’s sure to attract even more savvy brands to baseball.
Following the landmark June announcement last June, CBD inquiries increased 9x versus the month before, as MLB bigwigs researched over 150 cannabis brands. cbdMD led the list of CBD companies searched most frequently by MLB executives on the SU platform during the 2022 season–joining two others among the top 10 most searched brands overall.
Meanwhile, MLB’s sponsorship deal with Anheuser-Busch InBev–the longest in the league’s history at 42 years–extended A-B InBev’s marketing rights beyond Budweiser, the league’s co-exclusive beer sponsor, to encompass the megabrewer’s canned cocktails and hard seltzers. The move reflects the burgeoning popularity of other beverages within the Alcohol category, while beer’s own share has declined 13% over the last five years.