Leave it to Mr. Beast to make history. This week, the Charlotte Hornets announced that Feastables will sponsor their jersey patches for the 2023-24 season, marking the first time an influencer has sponsored a professional sports team.
I have to say…it’s brand new @feastable The logo looks great on the jersey. Feastables is the Official New Jersey Patch Partner for the 2023-24 season.
— Charlotte Hornets (@hornets) October 2, 2023
The brand is a line of Mr. Beast chocolate bars and gummies that was launched last year. It was taken over from LendingTree, which had previously been the Hornets’ patch sponsor. The patch sponsorship program began in his 2017-18 season, with dozens of small brands participating on the NBA’s official uniforms. This has allowed for some strange mashups, including Crypto.com. sixersThunder’s Love Truckstop, and Bibigo’s lakers –However, Mr. Beast is something completely different.
Here are the regional links. Mr. Beast was born and still lives in Greenville, in eastern North Carolina, where he shoots most of his videos with his friends. It’s still a little jarring to see an NBA team go all-in with a YouTuber like this, even if it’s to represent the candy brand.
Not only did the team go all-out by having players take on Mr. Beast-style challenges, but they also sent the team’s beloved mascot, Hugo Hornet, to Greenville to meet Mr. Beast.
It will be interesting to see how this develops. It’s all too easy to scoff at Mr. Beast’s involvement, but this partnership could open the Hornets to millions of out-of-state fans they otherwise wouldn’t have known. This is definitely one of his most interesting jersey patches I’ve ever seen.
