Women’s sports memorabilia is the next big thing, and The Realest is ready

Memorabilia matters. In an era of synthetic fakes and AI slop, these items bring fans back to “real-life memories and moments.” At its best, memorabilia allows athletes to directly profit from items that fervent fans want to own.

• But Keeney described the traditional memorabilia industry as “gated,” “antiquated,” and “riddled with fraud.” Issues with authentication and athletes’ ability to profit left “a market that was just wildly underserved in a number of sectors.”

• And if the men’s sports memorabilia market is this complicated, “I don't even know how to describe women's memorabilia,” Keeney said. “We always believed that [in women’s sports] there was a market that didn't have any access and was largely being ignored by this old-school industry for a number of reasons.”

The challenges in ensuring quality control and authenticity, plus the lack of attention to women fans and women’s sports, illustrated the need for a better system. “You might as well centralize control, protect your fans, and do it in an elevated way,” he explained. And that’s why The Realest entered the chat in 2023.

• Keeney knew the right people, like co-founder Venika Streeter, who runs the company’s patented authentication process after heading authentication for MLB’s Minnesota Twins for 15 years. Together, they wanted to create something different.

The space has traditionally catered to older, affluent, male consumers and is dominated by men’s sports history. But Keeney thought “a whole new demographic was being priced out, wasn't being marketed to and spoken to, and didn't have products or a platform that really connected with them.”

• “We launched, in essence, to create a new market [with] items that are affordable for everybody.”

The Realest has partnered with several women’s sports leagues and groups, including Unrivaled, the aforementioned 85ers, Athlos, and the PWHL. They told us how this investment turned out:

• 💰 Unrivaled and PWHL auctions generated more than $1.4M in total sales, with nearly 9.3K bids placed by over 1K collectors across both leagues.

• 🏀 The Unrivaled collection drew nearly 4.5K bids from over 500 bidders. Top-selling items included Angel Reese and Sabrina Ionescu game-worn jerseys, as well as the basketball used during the league’s Philadelphia stop. Game-used Unrivaled basketballs went for more than men’s basketballs in historic categories.

• 🏒 The PWHL auction drew over 4.8K bids from over 500 collectors, riding the momentum of the U.S. women’s hockey team’s Olympic gold medal. A game-worn Minnesota Frost Taylor Heise jersey went for a record $6,502, and game-worn jerseys drove 54.5% of total sales.

Even Keeney was surprised by the numbers. His conversation with the 85ers shed light on the runaway success: He realized that women’s sports fans are uniquely primed to find and engage with any platform supporting women’s sports because they’re used to going out of their way to engage with their fandom — think lack of media access, live events, or merch. “I think it was the perfect storm,” Keeney said.

The Realest and its women’s sports partners prove the concept of 1,000 True Fans: You don’t need to win over every sports fan, but if you have a community of ultra-loyal followers, they’ll keep showing up in big ways. After all, both the PWHL and Unrivaled auctions generated thousands in sales from about 500 bidders each.

• These hyperloyal fans can be converted to hyperloyal consumers: It doesn’t take much to get dedicated women’s sports fans over the finish line in terms of purchasing consideration.

It’s no coincidence that this startup has had success with the newer leagues and companies across women’s sports. Emerging leagues “are more open to doing things, and I think that's why the experiences probably are better…because you're not riddled with this legacy infrastructure and model…They're able to really cater to a new generation, which is why I think women's sports are really having a moment,” Keeney said. This is the moment.