For brands with strong community ties, like a podcast tour, market selection sends a powerful message. Skipping certain cities or regions can make loyal fans feel ignored or disliked, triggering a vocal backlash from a customer base that feels a strong sense of ownership.

Being a new entity without decades of tradition, or 'spots on the leopard,' allows Unrivaled to rapidly adopt modern practices like player-led social media. This agility is a key competitive advantage over established leagues burdened by heritage and slow-moving governance structures.

Unrivaled positions itself not as a competitor to the WNBA, but as a complementary league that supports the entire ecosystem. By providing WNBA players a domestic offseason opportunity to compete and build their brands, Unrivaled helps raise the profile of the players and women's basketball as a whole.

To grow a sports franchise's value, owners must heavily invest in the fan experience and player talent. Magic Johnson's group spent hundreds of millions on stadium upgrades for the Dodgers. This upfront spending drove higher revenues and caused the team's valuation to skyrocket, proving the investment thesis.

The allure of expanding into a major market like New York City can be a trap. Fully exploit the potential of your existing, more manageable markets first. Chasing expansion for the sake of prestige before you've maximized local potential is a common business mistake.

Unrivaled's teams aren't tied to cities, challenging the traditional sports model. The commissioner's initial concern about fan loyalty was unfounded, as fans quickly adopted team identities like the 'Phantoms.' This strategy allows a new league to build a broad, digitally-native following from day one, unconstrained by geography.

Instead of opening franchises in distant locations, a new franchisor should first build 5-10 locations within a few hours' drive. This strategy, used by successful franchises like Orangetheory, allows for better oversight, support, and testing of the model before a national rollout.

To build a successful franchise, a business must first prove its model is profitable and repeatable. This requires operating three to five corporate-owned stores to perfect unit economics, training systems, brand voice, and operational simplicity before licensing the model to others.

Instead of a broad launch, Qualia focused exclusively on Massachusetts for about a year. This "geographic wedge" allowed them to build a dense local network, leverage customer introductions, and create competitive pressure that made them seem more established than they were nationally.