Georgia may adjust on highlight video behind Glory Glory paywall
ATHENS — Georgia athletic director Josh Brooks has heard the complaints from fans about the weekly football highlight video being placed behind a paywall.
There may be changes coming that would allow fans to see it without having to subscribe to Glory Glory, the subscription-based content and fan-experience product whose revenues help fund the athletic department as well as name, image and likeness payments for Bulldogs athletes.
Speaking after a Friday meeting of the Georgia Athletic Association board of directors, Brooks said that the department was considering making the video exclusive to Glory Glory for a period of time before releasing it for free consumption after that.
“But the world we live in now, content is behind paywalls everywhere you go,” he said. “That’s kind of the way the world’s evolved with content.”
Fans being required to subscribe to Glory Glory in order to see the highlight video from the Bulldogs’ season-opening win over Tennessee State was this week’s social-media kerfuffle for Bulldogs fans.
The well-produced videos featuring behind-the-scenes footage are a weekly staple for thousands of UGA diehards. Last year’s highlight video from the win over Alabama in the SEC championship game has drawn more than 30,000 views on YouTube.
Subscriptions to Glory Glory start at $20 per month and go up to $150, depending on membership benefits. Brooks said that paid subscriptions grew by about 10% this week, moving close to 2,000. UGA students are also eligible for free memberships.
“We’re trying to grow that platform to provide great value to it where we’re not talking about the cost of it, but the value of it,” Brooks said.
The monetization of the video was one more indication of the pressure in college athletics to create revenue. In the meeting, Brooks informed board members that the department is considering adding premium seating to Sanford Stadium as part of a long-term master plan as well as expanding seating beyond the outfield fences at Foley Field.
He fielded a question after the meeting about the possibility of an endorsement deal — as now permitted by the NCAA — for jersey patches for the football team. (Brooks said that “it doesn’t look like something’s going to happen for this year” but that the department is well-positioned for an agreement for the 2027 season that will “make a lot of sense from a revenue standpoint.”)
“Now more than ever, as we spoke earlier, revenue generation is critical to our success,” Brooks said in the meeting.
This past fiscal year, despite the contributions of the SEC’s television rights deal and the cash machine that is Sanford Stadium, the department had an operating loss of $3.2 million as expenses of $244.1 million outweighed revenues of $240.9 million, per the UGAAA.
The department does project a $12.5 million net gain for the 2027 fiscal year, with anticipated revenues of $238.8 million against operating expenses of $226.3 million.
After the meeting, UGA president Jere Morehead sidestepped questions about the videoconference meeting among SEC leaders on Thursday to discuss LSU’s membership after the Tigers football program’s attempt to add players who had been in NFL training camps.
The conference had threatened to take a vote on expelling LSU but did not after the football team ultimately did not put two players who had signed NFL contracts as undrafted rookies on the finalized roster.
“I’m going to have to stress to you, with two pending lawsuits, that I can’t comment on that matter,” Morehead said. “The commissioner and our legal counsel at the SEC are going to have to speak for the presidents.”
Morehead has been outspoken regarding the importance of the SEC’s capacity to create and enforce its own rules.
“I don’t want to comment on the LSU litigation, but I remain a strong advocate of the Southeastern Conference creating its own rules and governing itself,” he said.