DraftKings Announces ‘Sports & Social’ Partnership, Plans for Detroit and Nashville

• DraftKings and The Cordish Companies Live! Announce Partnership Thursday
• Plans are to bring ‘Sports & Social’ Concept to Detroit and Nashville
• Final Step: Approval by the Tennessee Education Lottery Corporation

DraftKings and The Cordish Companies Live! Announce Partnership Thursday

In a release on Thursday, DraftKings and The Cordish Companies Live! announced their new partnership with plans to bring upscale sports betting bars to both Detroit, Michigan, and Nashville, Tennessee.

DraftKings Chief Business Officer Ezra Kucharz said in a release:

DraftKings plans to bring its sports gaming products to life by offering engaging, interactive fan-first destinations to its customers in Nashville and Detroit.

The concept of combining luxury dining and drinking with live sports viewing and betting has been branded ‘Sports & Social’ by the company Live! Dining & Entertainment, a division of The Cordish Companies, a real estate development and entertainment operating company based in Baltimore, Maryland.

This new Sports and Social partnership and business model make perfect sense for DraftKings, the Boston-based daily fantasy sports contest and sports betting operator with multiple sportsbooks and betting retail locations already across the U.S.

Plans are to bring ‘Sports & Social’ Concept to Detroit and Nashville

The plan, as mentioned in Thursday’s release, is to bring a “Disney World for Sports Betting” experience to Detroit and Nashville sports fans, where they can eat and drink top-notch food and beverages while viewing live sporting events from around the world and placing bets using the DraftKings sportsbook.

The idea is to target certain areas in Detroit and Nashville that are already enjoying a local economic revitalization due to their proximity to the state’s pro sports teams.

The Detroit location has already been selected in the Woodward Square neighborhood in what is called the ‘District Detroit,’ a thriving quarter-mile area of the city that is home to the NHL’s Red Wings, the NBA’s Pistons, the NFL’s Lions, and the MLB’s Tigers.

The location in Nashville, however, is still up in the air – its Music Row district near the home of the NHL’s Predators and the NFL’s Titans could work – but first one crucial final step is still needing to take place in Tennessee.

Final Step: Approval by the Tennessee Education Lottery Corporation

Before this Sports and Social business model can be implemented in Nashville, it must first be approved by the state’s sports gaming regulator, the Tennessee Education Lottery Corporation (TELC).

But given that there are already Sports and Social locations in at least half a dozen other major cities – Atlanta, St. Louis, Arlington, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Maryland – the expectation is that TELC approval will simply be a formality.

As people once again begin to gather to socialize, they are going to want original activities to enjoy in person, and DraftKings CBO Kucharz is convinced that this new concept in upscale sports betting can fulfill those needs.

Today, so much of sports betting is focused on the mobile-technology aspect, however, the in-person experience is an integral layer that we look forward to advancing alongside Sports & Social’s premier dining and entertainment offerings.

Swanky activities Detroit and Nashville bettors can look forward to enjoying, perhaps in time for the upcoming NFL season which begins in early September.