Gm, welcome to the lobby.

Grab your coffee, ready up, and let’s drop in 🪂
Here’s what we have for you today:

• adidas Originals and 100 Thieves launch collaborative collection 👟 

• Founding Fathers LAN Tournament: FaZe Clan, 100 Thieves, and OpTic Gaming are coming together for throwback Call of Duty event 🎮

• Monetizing Your X (Twitter): CDL Intel Case Study 📊

• F1 Opens First Arcade in Boston, announces Washington DC and Las Vegas locations 🏎️

🏟️ Are you going to DreamHack Dallas?

DreamHack is in Dallas this week Friday, May 31st through Sunday, June 2nd, and we want to meet you! The whole Private Lobby team will be attending on Saturday, please reply and let us know if you’re attending!

👟 adidas Originals and 100 Thieves Launch Collaborative Collection

Michael Jordan & Nike, Steph Curry & Under Armour, Nadeshot & adidas? A new 100 Thieves/Nadeshot x adidas Originals collab is coming May 31st!

adidas, 100 Thieves, and Nadeshot, have teased a "first of its kind apparel & footwear collection" with special edition 100 Thieves/Nadeshot-branded adidas shoes.

This collab comes just a few months after adidas became the official apparel provider for 100 Thieves this January.

*It is important to note that this is not adidas' first shoe collab with a gaming content creator, adidas did release a Ninja-branded shoe in 2020.

💯 The Collection

adidas announced the collaboration and gave details about the collection:
“The first ever collaborative collection between the Trefoil and 100 Thieves consists of a daring suite of apparel, footwear, and accessories. The apparel selection features the previously announced competition jersey – with sponsor logos removed – in men’s and women’s sizing, as well as 100 Thieves’ take on the classic adidas track-suit presented as a matching half-zip track top and track pants in brushed cotton-terry. Rounding out the selection of apparel and accessories are a classic white tee with embroidered logo, a 3-pack of socks in 100 Thieves colors, and a co-branded towel.

The collection is then highlighted by 100 Thieves’ take on an iconic adidas sneaker: the Rivalry Nadeshot. With a tonal off-white upper, gum rubber outsole, and co-branded details including lace charms and sock liners, as well as Nadeshot logos on the right heel mustache and tongues, the daring look is the 100 Thieves founder’s first ever collaborative sneaker.”

👀 Our POV 

Ok, I'll admit my Michael Jordan & Steph Curry line was bait. This collab is only similar in the sense that Nadeshot is an influencer in the same way MJ and Steph are but this is still really cool to see.

I'm confident the 100 Thieves x adidas Originals apparel will do great; the tracksuit is dope and I expect these to be a mainstay at Call of Duty events for a long time but I am really curious to see how the shoe sells. Partnerships like these are huge for content creators and the industry as a whole — if this collection, particularly the shoe, achieve or exceed adidas and 100 Thieves goals, it could encourage adidas (and it’s competitors) to produce more of these influencer-led collaborations.

- Zach Eller (Private Lobby)

🎮 Founding Fathers LAN Tournament: FaZe Clan, 100 Thieves, and OpTic Gaming are coming together for throwback Call of Duty event

More 100 Thieves?! FaZe Clan, 100 Thieves, and OpTic Gaming are coming together to host the Founding Fathers LAN Tournament, a throwback Call of Duty event featuring 4 different Call of Duty games.

The 3 iconic gaming & esports organizations, led by industry “OGs” Hector ‘H3CZ’ Rodriguez, Richard ‘FaZe Banks’ Bengston, and Matthew ‘Nadeshot’ Haag, each made their come ups in Call of Duty and have cultivated some of the strongest fanbases and subsequent rivalries in all of gaming & esports.

The headliner for the event is a Banks and Nadeshot 1v1 on Modern Warfare 2’s iconic Rust map on an Xbox 360.

👀 Our POV

The Founding Fathers LAN is really cool to see and a great way to reignite the fanbases passion for their organizations, their leaders, and Call of Duty.

The date of this event is interesting, with it being hosted the day before DreamHack Dallas starts — is this a clever way of bringing folks together to collaborate that were already going to be in the same place anyways?

Regardless, this is going to be a fun watch to see throwback Call of Duty and some fun, heated rivalries, as you know none of these guys are going to want to lose. Bragging rights are the prize here, and that’s more than enough.

- Zach Eller (Private Lobby)

📊 Monetizing Your X (Twitter): CDL Intel Case Study

A little bit of self-promo here — but Zach and I at POV Strategy & Research (the parent brand of Private Lobby) recently partnered with CDL Intel to run their daily social media, create and manage a larger market strategy, and spearhead sponsorships & sales.

CDL Intel is a news & update account around competitive Call of Duty, gaining over 350,000+ followers in 5 years with just a single person running the account off of their phone.

Prior to us stepping in, the account had all of these massive impression & engagement numbers but near $0 in revenue. We worked with Crone, owner of the account, and set a strategy to help grow and monetize the account. Our philosophy was based around two key objectives:

• Increase the frequency of posting, without spamming the account

• Naturally integrate sponsors into content that fans already want & love

CDL Major III (May 16-19) was our first full-on event — integrating Mavix as our “Major III coverage partner” . Mavix is a gaming chair brand that fits our brand authentically and really is made for our audience. “Mavix was created for gamers looking for a better solution than the traditional race car seat gaming chair.”

Overall we saw fantastic impressions & engagement from the account overall. With this being the first time introducing consistent video posts to the account — we set a record for the account bringing in over 1,000,000 video views. And that’s just on X/Twitter!

Our Major IV campaign featured two categories:

• Posts/Social Content Series (presented by Mavix)

• Posts with Mavix inclusion (in photo and tag)

For posts owned by Mavix, we took content that fans already enjoyed and engaged with well in the past and brought Mavix along for the ride with wording such as “Mavix Man of the Match” — so they truly own the moment. We made a “MOTM” post for every match of the event, keeping fans up to date on who’s doing well in the tournament while also including Mavix promotion.

It’s a natural way to introduce our followers to the brand in a way that isn’t too forceful, sale-sy, or boring.

For our Mavix inclusion posts, we included Mavix on all of our social graphics & also tagged them in photos to lead our followers to their account naturally.

These types of posts ranged from elimination posts, bracket updates, to daily schedules, and even the championship winning graphic that generated 330K impressions alone.

👀 Looking Forward

As for what we’re looking to improve as we get closer to the Call of Duty League’s Major IV and Champs in June and July:

• We will be expanding CDL Intel outside of Twitter/X, getting the brand on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, etc.

• Introduce more content, especially video content surrounding the stars of the league

• New ways to support and integrate sponsors that help both parties

🚨 Opportunity Alert

If you’d like to discuss partnering with CDL Intel or if you’re looking for help when it comes to marketing, social, and/or sponsorships, feel free to reach out to myself or Zach! You can find us at our website HERE.

- Justin Palacios (Private Lobby)

🏎️ F1 Opens First Arcade in Boston, Announces Washington DC and Las Vegas Locations

Formula 1 has been exploding in popularity across the globe. Off of the success of their Netflix series “Drive To Survive”, F1 has seen record viewership and attendance. If you haven’t seen it yet, “Drive To Survive” takes fans behind the scenes of Formula 1, showing how the teams operate and helping build storylines around the racers & their personalities.

Taking advantage of the hype, Formula 1 has rolled out their “F1 Arcade” across Europe, and now for the first time, the United States.

F1 Arcade is Formula 1’s take on Top Golf/Puttshack, a new type of entertainment experience that has been on the rise recently. Offering quality food & drink options along with entertainment that can be enjoyed by anyone.

The F1 Arcade features a menu inspired by cuisine from across the globe from tacos, to flatbreads, to a raw bar seafood menu, to classic burgers. Along with the food selection, the F1 Arcade will have signature cocktails & mocktails inspired by Formula 1 racing with names like “Start Your Engines”, “Pole Position”, and “Smokin’ Lap”. 🍸

After you get your food & drink fix you can hop on one of the many racing simulators they have set up. With the sims, you can race on any of the iconic F1 tracks against your friends, or race against yourself and your previous lap times.

Tickets for the arcade come out to $30 for general admission and $95 for VIP which includes a welcome champagne, unlimited food and guaranteed seats in the private room.

F1 Arcade recently announced it’s Las Vegas location at The Forum Shops at Caesars Palace, which is attached to the destination’s iconic Caesars Palace Las Vegas. The Las Vegas opening marks the next phase of an ambitious US roll-out plan following the opening of its first US location in Boston Seaport in April. F1 Arcade will open in Washington DC this autumn and plan to open 30 locations globally across the next five years.

👀 Our POV

As a fan of Formula 1 (Woo Mercedes 🙏), I love this concept of being able to virtually race just like the pros. Whether you want to try racing like the pros in a fully built out racing sim, or you just wanna go out with some friends, I feel like a venue like this covers all the bases.

I’m interested to see how ideas like this could expand. We’ve seen venues like Top Golf & Puttshack “gamify” traditional sports and accompany it with food & drink options. But is there a market to build out LAN centers similar to this? Taking “bar-cades” up a notch? Maybe Nintendo opens a bar with Nintendo-themed food & drink options which then leads to massive comfy setups to play Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Mario Party, or other Nintendo titles… 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔

- Justin Palacios (Private Lobby)

💼 Job Board

• Director of Product Marketing, Dungeons & Dragons at Wizards of the Coast (Remote, US)

• Influencer Campaign Manager for Disobey (Remote, UK)

• Associate Community Manager, Action Adventure for Electronic Arts (Marina del Rey, CA)

• Industry Partner Relations Manager (SMB) for Unity (Copenhagen, Denmark)

• Development Director - EA FC for Electronic Arts (Vancouver, Canada)

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Disclaimer: our views are ours and in no way represent those of our employers.