Wednesday, October 16, 2013

'Only 8.01% Pink NFL Merchandise Going Towards Cancer Research'

"According to data obtained from the NFL by Darren Rovell of ESPN, the NFL "takes a 25% royalty from the wholesale price (1/2 retail), donates 90% of royalty to American Cancer Society."

In other words, for every $100 in pink merchandise sold, $12.50 goes to the NFL. Of that, $11.25 goes to the American Cancer Society (ACS) and the NFL keeps the rest. The remaining money is then divided up by the company that makes the merchandise (37.5%) and the company that sells the merchandise (50.0%)

Then consider that only 71.2% of money the ACS receives goes towards research and cancer programs."

In the end, after everybody has taken their cut, only 8.01% of money spent on pink NFL merchandise is actually going towards cancer research"

It is unclear how much of the 50% markup for items being sold directly by the NFL and the teams is going to the ACS, if any at all."

Of course, in addition to money, the NFL is also raising awareness for breast cancer and it is hard to put a value on that."

If fans want to show support for their team and for breast cancer awareness, that is great. But if the point is to actually help fight cancer, fans would have a much bigger impact if they skipped the NFL and donated directly to the ACS or other organizations working to fight cancer."

Business Insider

20 comments:

chickelit said...

The last thing the NFL needs is more money.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

Donating money for scientific research is a great way to fight breast cancer.

So is maintaining a healthy body weight.

Calypso Facto said...

The point of the pink merch. sales is to enrich the NFL and its cronies while allowing the purchaser to feel smug and charitable about a self-serving purchase, with a mere nod towards actually resolving the underlying problem.

Almost exactly like supporting a 4 trillion dollar government bureaucracy to "manage" poverty.

Methadras said...

Shocker. The whole thing is a scam. God, when are people going to ever learn. I can be very cold and callous with shit like this, but I won't.

AllenS said...

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that when a lot of the football players learn this, they'll want a cut in the action.

Michael Haz said...

The breast cancer fund raising thing bothers me a bit. Not that breast cancer isn't bad - my wife had it and it's awful - but it takes money away from other other kinds of cancer research.

Is breast cancer more or less horrible than pediatric cancer? Or ovarian cancer? Or melanoma? Or prostate cancer? Or brain cancer? They (and other forms of cancer) are all equally deadly, so why should one type of cancer get so much more funding, so much more attention?

It really isn't right.

Rabel said...

You may wish to review section VII of the ACS 2011 Form 990.

With charity for all.

Calypso Facto said...

"why should one type of cancer get so much more funding, so much more attention? "

Because it successfully sells to the otherwise virtually untapped women's football merchandise market!

Calypso Facto said...

RE: Rabel, ouch.

Michael Haz said...

@Rable - Thanks. More than $1 billion in assets........none of it applied to cancer research.

It's not much more than a giant PR machine, is it?

Michael Haz said...

$1.7 billion of revenue and $352 million of grants made. Just under 21% of funds raised went to research. Probably less than that if the grants were made to research organizations like universities that also took a big slice off the top for overhead and administration.

Making me dang angry,

Amartel said...

The NFL exists in order to make money for the teams. So the fact that they exploit charitable giving for self-enrichment is not really surprising.

The ACS exists in order to "transform cancer from deadly to preventable" (from their website). So the fact that they exploit charitable giving for self-enrichment is __________________.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Rabel - wow. It's almost as if the tax code is crazy and complicated to promote skimming and scamming.

Icepick said...

My wife gets annoyed by the NFL/Breast Cancer Awareness Month stuff because she believes it is targeting the wrong audience with the wrong concern. She believes the NFL ought to target prostate cancer awareness instead. The NFL even has a potential spokesman for the cause in Len Dawson.

chickelit said...

Icepick, the problem is that most guys love breasts and hate to see them hurt or damaged. They're not really thinking self interest as many assume.

Icepick said...

They're not really thinking self interest as many assume.

Which is exactly why my wife thinks the NFL ought to push for prostate cancer awareness.

Note, while she has had her own breast cancer scare when she was younger, she lost her father to prostate cancer before he even hit sixty. So this is a sore topic for her.

virgil xenophon said...

And don't more men die from prostate cancer than women from breast cancer, iirc? But who wants to do anything for heteronormal males, right? The quicker we die off the better, right? Not only are we un-PC, breasts are sexier..

Trooper York said...

This is the problem with most charities. The NFL is not unique in this.

ken in tx said...

Actually more men do get prostate cancer than women get breast cancer, but they mostly don't die of it. Most men with prostate cancer die of something else, before the cancer gets them.

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