Soccer Stars Extend Fashion Partnerships Beyond the World Cup

By Marcus Bennett

Three months after Spain won the World Cup, fashion brands kept launching soccer partnerships as self-identified U.S. soccer fans rose 10% year over year to about 75 million, according to Bloomberg. That momentum gives brands a larger post-tournament audience to address, but neither Farm Rio nor American Eagle has disclosed campaign spending or sales results.

During the summer tournament, fashion brands and soccer stars launched a flurry of collaborations. Three months later, new deals continue as residual attention turns players and teams into broader consumer draws, particularly for U.S. brands whose audiences now recognize many of them as household names.

Farm Rio announced last week that it is partnering with Real Madrid, with Adidas also involved. The Brazilian label’s largest market outside Brazil is the U.S., and the partnership targets an international audience through the Flamengo Collection, a capsule collection (a limited product line).

The capsule features five signature Farm Rio prints over Real Madrid’s signature white colorway (overall color scheme) and gives the club’s branding substantial visibility. It extends a 2024 Flamengo collection that used soccer imagery without tying the design to a specific team.

Jude Bellingham and Vinicius Junior front the campaign. Barros said the appeal among American women was a factor in the brand’s decision.

“Our customer is absolutely still energized [from the World Cup],” said Kátia Barros, Farm Rio’s co-founder, designer and creative director. She described her football (soccer) audience this way: “Many women love football but have never felt that traditional fan merchandise was made for them.” She said collaborations let fans “wear their passion with color, personality and style, on matchday and every day.”

She said the response to its football collections had “always been incredibly emotional” and that fans still ask for pieces from the first Flamengo collection. Farm Rio first teamed with Adidas for a soccer collection in 2024.

GQ reported that Bellingham gained roughly 1 million Instagram followers after each World Cup match. For many Americans, the tournament was their first exposure to the Real Madrid player, and GQ profiled women who went from never hearing of him to following him obsessively and sharing fan edits within days.

His name ranked among TikTok’s top 30 trending topics in America. Google’s most popular Bellingham-related search was “Is Jude Bellingham my husband?”

American Eagle (AE) began working with 19-year-old Spain star Lamine Yamal in January, before the tournament. Yamal gained more than 5 million social media followers in the U.S. during the competition, giving the pre-tournament relationship a sizable domestic audience before its first product launch.

AE released its first Yamal collaboration in September as a back-to-school collection built around his popularity with Gen Z. The launch extends American Eagle’s recent athlete-marketing pattern, which included last year’s Travis Kelce collaboration.

Jennifer Foyle, president and executive creative director of American Eagle and Aerie, confirmed that the September collection begins a planned multi-year collaboration. She said it is not a one-off attempt to capitalize on Yamal’s World Cup victory.

Foyle put the rationale in a press statement: “Soccer attracts an unrivaled global following, and our multi-year partnership with Lamine Yamal centers AE at the heart of the fandom–highlighting our commitment to him, the sport and our customers.” The announcement did not include spending, sales or return-on-investment figures for the partnership.

What does this change for fashion marketers?

These campaigns show that soccer partnerships can extend beyond the tournament. Farm Rio is using a post-event capsule and American Eagle is extending a January relationship into a multi-year program, giving both brands reasons to keep soccer merchandise and promotion visible beyond the final match.

Audience fit matters alongside raw scale. Bellingham’s roughly 1 million Instagram followers after each match and Yamal’s gain of more than 5 million U.S. followers during the tournament show the reach available. Farm Rio’s women-focused merchandise rationale adds a distinct opening in the 75 million-fan U.S. market.

For budget decisions, those follower figures indicate potential reach, not proof of commercial return. Neither campaign disclosed spending, sales or campaign-level results, so practitioners should treat them as evidence of durable audience interest and merchandise relevance, not a validated sales formula.

The practical takeaway is to judge soccer partnerships on whether a brand serves a defined fandom need, then build a longer calendar around that relationship. The new Real Madrid capsule and confirmed multi-year Yamal plan suggest off-field relevance can matter as much as match-day attention, though no return-on-investment benchmark was provided.