Rawlings' NFT Revolution in Baseball Collectibles

Dream Syndicate revolutionized Rawlings collectible baseball gloves with a groundbreaking NFT drop. Rawlings, the official baseball glove manufacturer of Major League Baseball, aimed to future-proof their business by venturing into "The Metaverse," an emerging market. They sought assistance from Dream Syndicate to navigate the complexities of modern technologies, platforms, and marketplaces to identify a suitable entry point.

Dream Syndicate developed strategies for utilizing Augmented Reality in pre and post-sale consumer engagement, growing brand recognition through activations in networked socialized gaming platforms, and opening up a brand new avenue of brand engagement and sales through the Web3 space. The Rawlings PRIMUS NFT collection was born – a limited edition series of 461 NFTs tied to real-life baseball gloves, featuring four tiers of rarity, individually stamped models, and unique designs for both the NFTs and physical glove collectibles. The ultra-rare, limited edition physical gloves were designed and manufactured exclusively for this NFT drop and will never be produced again.

The PRIMUS NFT collection was available for purchase on OpenSea, the leading NFT marketplace, with Ethereum (ETH) cryptocurrency. The first round of sales was conducted as private "allowlist" transactions for active Rawlings NFT community members on Discord. Each NFT purchase included an unlockable AR USDZ of the corresponding 3D NFT. PRIMUS NFTs were also available for purchase through the Rawlings.com ecommerce website for non-Web3 savvy collectible glove enthusiasts.

Dream Syndicate provided a turnkey solution for this project, including pre-launch, launch, and post-launch strategies for production, execution, promotion, and community building. They designed and produced animated 3D NFT graphics for the collection using photogrammetry scans of the physical gloves for accuracy. The NFTs and corresponding physical collectible gloves were produced in four tiers of rarity: Pro (300 editions), Gold (150 editions), Platinum (10 editions), and The Lindor, a one-of-one NFT and glove designed and signed by NY Mets' Francisco Lindor. Each NFT is custom numbered to match its physical counterpart for a truly unique digital collectible. They also designed and produced promotional assets, created a promotional calendar with targeted messaging for social media platforms, banner ads, and email blasts. They designed, created, and managed the Rawlings Discord server for community engagement, project updates, allowlist management, and custom swag giveaways. Social media promotions and contests were executed through Discord to build excitement and engage with Rawlings fans throughout the lead-up to, and following the NFT drop.

Dream Syndicate designed and developed a microsite as the home base for the PRIMUS NFT project, including information about the NFT drop, imagery of the NFTs and gloves, a preview of the AR unlockable, a project roadmap, FAQ, and more. They provided management and support for the project from start to finish, maintaining schedules, ensuring delivery of milestones, engaging with 3rd party vendors, and supporting customers.

The Rawlings PRIMUS NFT collection was embraced by the passionate community of future-minded baseball glove enthusiasts and NFT collectors. While PRIMUS NFT sales are over, they are available on the second-hand market at OpenSea.