Vikings Announce U.S. Bank As Naming Rights Partner For New Stadium
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The Vikings have announced U.S. Bank as the naming-rights partner for the forthcoming stadium in downtown Minneapolis.
The publicly funded Vikings stadium is helping make the team more valuable than it's ever been before: Now worth nearly $1.2 billion dollars, according to Forbes Magazine.
After anonymous sources first reported the naming rights to the Sports Business Journal, the team formally announced a 20-year investment from U.S. Bank for the new facility, which will be called "U.S. Bank Stadium," making it the fourth NFL facility to have a bank in its title.
It would also be the second stadium in the Twin Cities metro area with a bank in its name, after TCF Bank Stadium on the University of Minnesota campus.
Finance expert David Vang of the University of St. Thomas says the naming rights are a great deal for the Vikings.
"Anything they can sell their naming rights for is a direct offset of what they had to pay up front," Vang said.
The deal, according to sources who spoke to the Sports Business Journal, is worth $220 million over the course of a quarter century.
The Vikings owners will spend $551 million dollars of their own money on the $1 billion dollar facility, but they'll get millions back in naming rights: $100 million from personal seat licenses, and up to $200 million in loans from the NFL.
Chairman and CEO of U.S. Bank is Richard Davis led Minnesota's successful effort to host the 2018 Super Bowl. Now his company's name will be on the stadium where it's played.
