Tennessee-driven NIL collective Volunteer Club to host 'Night in Neyland'

The Volunteer Club continues to create innovative ways to produce revenue for Tennessee athletes.

The NIL collective announced plans Wednesday for a “Night in Neyland,” scheduled for the Vols game at Florida on Sept. 16. Members of the Volunteer Club will have the chance to watch the game at the social deck inside Neyland Stadium.

It’s an unprecedented move at Tennessee, allowing fans to watch a game from inside the stadium on the jumbotron. Along with access to the social deck, free food from Gus’s Fried Chicken and beverages will be provided. A VIP ticket package will include a private tour of the football locker room and field access prior to kickoff.

Ticket pacakges start at $100, with Orange and Smokey collective members allowed begin to purchasing tickets on Friday at 1 p.m. ET. Checkerboard members will gain access on Monday, followed by Rocky Top members next Wednesday.

Holding an event at Neyland would not be possible without The Volunteer Club becoming an official partner of Tennessee athletics in June by securing a sponsorship agreement with Learfield. Through the partnership, the collective now has full use of the institution’s marks and colors. It will also have the opportunity to advertise during athletic events at Neyland Stadium and Thompson-Boling Arena, for example.

Tennessee athletic director Danny White publicly promoted the collective, too. As donor fatigue continues to be a growing concern for collectives, the unique event provides real value to Volunteer Club members. With the dawn of the NIL Era, more and more attention has been spent on filling war chests to make programs successful in the recruiting and retention game.

With donors pouring in money to help fund collectives, the stakes and on-field expectations are sky-high. Creating real value that is not contingent on the win and loss column has become a mission for collectives.

“They [donors] want to win. They see the plan that we have in place,” James Clawson, the co-founder of The Volunteer Club, previously told On3. “We’re going to start doing more targeted ads, almost identical to how a political campaign would target fundraising dollars. Take that same mentality from different folks in the political arena to kind of tap into what makes them so successful.”

Volunteer Club leads The Collective Association

Spyre Sports Group, which manages The Volunteer Club, laid the framework in June for an NIL collective trade association. Those efforts resulted in the founding of The Collective Association, nicknamed “TCA,” which features seven NIL entities with plans to grow.

The TCA plans to spend substantial time assisting its peers, whether it be talking through the NCAA’s most recent guidance or the memo released in June by the IRS aimed at non-profit collectives. The TCA has also begun talks of a revenue-sharing model for college athletes. The thought is a portion of TV revenue should be distributed by conferences to an “official” institution collective in equal shares. For example, an SEC collective could receive $5 to $10 million annually. This could theoretically relieve pressure for boosters to constantly produce more funds, as has been the case in the last 24 months.

From there the collective distributes the money to athletes, the TCA leaders said. The third-party option ensures athletes are not viewed as employees of schools.

Named On3’s top-ranked ambitious NIL collective earlier this summer, The Volunteer Club has grown to 3,000 members with an expansive e-commerce business. According to co-founder Hunter Baddour, Spyre has executed 1,400 deals since July 2021. They currently have 90 athletes on active contracts. Spyre told On3 in February the Volunteer Club had procured $13.5 million in NIL deals.