“Shows You the Gap in Merchandise”: Sue Bird Discusses the Origin of ‘Everybody Watches Women’s Sports’ T-Shirt

The stereotype that women’s sports aren’t as enticing to watch is dying. The US Women’s Soccer Team easily beats the Men’s Team in terms of viewership. Fox Sports averaged a record-shattering 4.35 million viewers during the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup group stages. The WNBA’s viewership also skyrocketed in 2024. While games featuring Caitlin Clark consistently surpassed the 1 million viewers mark, the 2024 WNBA Finals between the Liberty and Lynx also averaged 1.6 million on ESPN broadcasts, a 115% increase from 2023.

Sue Bird is one of the pioneers who laid the groundwork for this change. Although she retired from basketball in 2022, she’s continued to have an impact off the court. Her clothing brand is capitalizing on the meteoric rise in interest in women’s sports and creating merchandise that isn’t the standard run-off-the-mill apparel.

On Yankees icon Alex Rodriguez and Bloomberg correspondent Jason Kelly’s The Deal podcast, Bird spoke about how critical merchandising is, and how her emphasis on it gave birth to the iconic ‘Everyone Watches Women’s Sports‘ t-shirt. She said,

“So one part of it shows you the gap in merchandise that exists in women’s sports. You can’t get like, cool stuff in women’s sports. It’s changing don’t get me wrong… The ‘Everyone Watches Women’s Sports’ t-shirts proves the huge gap that is in merchandise in women’s sports but it also proves we’re a business.”

The shirt was created by a brand called Togethxr, which Bird, soccer superstar Alex Morgan, snowboarder Chloe Kim, and swimmer Simone Manuel founded in 2021. It went viral during the 2024 Paris Olympics.

 

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Their goal is to change the archaic strategy that sports teams use to appease female fans. Bird explained,

“When they wanted to merch for women, they would make it smaller and then they would just make it pink. Pink it and shrink it.”

The five-time Olympic gold medalist invested in this venture to help make women’s sports a viable business. Bird highlighted that many viewed women’s sports as a “charity” and she’s keen on flipping the narrative.

Notable figures that wore the merch

Despite the star-studded team behind the brand responsible for the ‘Everybody Watches Women’s Sports‘ t-shirt, it needed the support of notable figures to push the message. One of the key figures who brought awareness to the brand was South Carolina women’s basketball head coach, Dawn Staley.

She wore the shirt in a regular season game in December 2023 and following the game, she provided her reasoning for donning the t-shirt, saying,

“Women’s basketball, women’s sports are at an all-time high and it’s in high demand.”

 

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Warriors superstar Stephen Curry displayed his support for the movement as he wore the shirt in early October.

 

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Women’s sports continue to grow at a record-breaking pace and show no signs of slowing down, and it wouldn’t have been possible without pioneers like Bird, who continues to contribute in any shape or form she can.