The Tamesis
Welcome to The Scoop: a weekly email series where I ask fashion insiders about the week’s stories. This will be a way for the Vogue business community to synthesize and reflect on the latest headlines every Friday and get some insider information.
This week’s guest is Mary Beckett. Mary is global chief executive of YMU, a talent management agency which lists Simon Cowell, TV presenter Graham Norton and chicken shop dateAmelia Dimoldenberg is one of its clients.
During her time at the helm, YMU has transformed from a small, UK-focused company (formerly the James Grant Group) into a global, social-first business. Mary has also been instrumental in supporting gender equality at both business and client levels. That last point relates to today’s scoop.
Hi Mary, any scoop?
YMU will launch a women’s soccer division. We’re going to take all the infrastructure that YMU has – and the infrastructure that’s already in place for the male football players – and apply it to the female football players and really give them the boost they deserve in their careers.
What led to this decision?
I think the timing is undeniable. Women’s football has always been seen as complementary to men’s football, but I think that’s now being contested. Apparently we had a big moment with the lioness [England’s women’s soccer team]won British hearts and minds, but beyond that we think the culture shifted and the business world captivated audiences. Women’s football is one of the fastest growing sports in the world – with the WSL reaching record ratings and attendances.
What kind of people are you recruiting for this new department?
We’re looking for people with a genuine interest in women’s football who have strong commercial credentials – people who can deal on and off the pitch, because we see a huge opportunity to create a huge ecosystem around these women. We want to build audiences around each player and help them tell stories across platforms so people get to know them as people. This is very exciting for us, and it leverages what we have at YMU, which is a broader IP architecture.
I think that answers my next question, but how are you going to work with brands?
We don’t approach any client differently than we would any other client by trying to fundamentally understand what North Star means to each client. So, whatever this person wants to achieve in five, ten, fifteen years – how do we help them get there? How do we find the right brands to be long-term creative partners rather than short-term transactional partners?
We have long-standing relationships with many brands working in beauty, fashion, health or lifestyle, so we can put a lot of these footballers at the center of the Venn diagram.
I myself have been thinking a lot about the conversations surrounding women at work. The world works very differently than it did even a decade ago.
It’s confusing because expectations for women are increasing and we’re still operating within structures that weren’t built for us. The amount of social pressure combined with the complete lack of support is staggering. Even with female football players, few companies take into account female anatomy, female hormones and all the factors that go into a woman’s performance on the field. We operate within a framework that was never built for us and refuse to change to accommodate us.
