GREEN BAY, Wis. (WFRV) – Years before the NFL Draft arrives in its host city, millions of dollars are already invested into competitive bids to secure the event. For the Packers, years of effort culminated on April 27, 2023, when it was announced that the 2025 NFL Draft would be coming to Titletown.
“For the Packers, bringing the draft to Green Bay was a tremendous opportunity for the community,” said Packers Director of Public Affairs Aaron Popkey. “We knew there was going to be investment, and we were likely going to lose money from that standpoint. In fact, we had to go out and raise some money.”
Titletown’s Turn: Local 5 highlights the economic impacts of the 2025 NFL Draft in Green Bay
The Packers contributed $1 million to the bid, while the state and other partners provided an additional $6.5 million.
“We’ve got a lot of great donors that have had a similar vision in that this is a tremendous opportunity for the community to benefit from,” Popkey said. “It is a running commercial for the community, and we felt that it was worth the investment.”
The magnitude of the event, paired with the decades of dedication from fans and the community, made hosting the draft a goal the Packers pursued relentlessly. Beginning in 2016, multiple bids were made until the organization and its partners finally succeeded in 2023.
“We felt it was a no-brainer. It’s the largest offseason event the NFL has, and it’s turned into such a huge event—a festival and a celebration of football,” Popkey said. “The Packers have had over a hundred-year relationship with the community and received support through the years. Early on, it was stock sales and season ticket drives that kept the team afloat.”
Not only did the Packers and their collaborators secure the funding to win the bid, but they also demonstrated to the NFL that Green Bay could successfully host the event.
“We had the ability to really go after it and convince the league that this community can put it on. There’s a number of like-minded individuals and entities that felt this opportunity was worth pursuing,” Popkey said. “We do expect to spend more than we take in, and for us, that was OK because of the greater benefit to the community and the long-lasting effects we know it will have.”
While the event offers significant community benefits, it is not expected to bolster the Packers’ bottom line.
“The NFL, the way they operate it, they generate the revenue—from concessions that are onsite, retail opportunities that are onsite, their sponsorship that helps drive revenue,” Popkey explained. “The Packers, we’ll be able to offset that a little bit with some of the retail operations. We’ve got an arrangement with the NFL—they take over retail, but we’ve still got our Pro Shop we can still run.”
According to Popkey, even the NFL is unlikely to turn a profit from the draft, which is free to attend.
“For the NFL, it’s really a break-even-at-best proposition because of the amount of expense they put into the event, in terms of all the people they bring in, the draft theater that gets constructed, all the pieces that go into it,” he said.
While some estimates project the draft will generate $20 million in economic impact for Green Bay and Brown County, Popkey believes the most significant long-term benefit will be attracting larger events to Green Bay in the future.
“There’s other large-scale events that maybe didn’t consider Green Bay and northeastern Wisconsin before. Maybe after this event, they’ll see that we’re able to manage this and put on a good event,” Popkey said. “I think the types of events that we’ve had that we continue to go after are concerts—we’ve hosted the largest touring acts that go out.”
Titletown’s Turn: Local 5 highlights the economic impacts of the 2025 NFL Draft in Green Bay
Sports will always have a home at Lambeau Field, and the Packers are exploring opportunities ranging from collegiate games to international competitions.
“We expanded our effort to go speak with athletic directors at colleges to talk about those early-season [football] games, those week zero games,” Popkey said. “We’ve had discussions with FIFA for hosting a team as a base camp for the World Cup [in 2026], and that’s an ongoing conversation that we’re having. We’ve spoken with a couple of federations of the countries that are involved, and we’ll see where it goes.”
