Wilderness Agency & Premiership Rugby’s ‘Premiership Rugby Final Campaign’ won Gold in Social Sports, Wellness, and more at The Drum Awards, achieving the fastest sell-out in history and growing the 18-34 fanbase significantly through a platform-first strategy.
The Premiership Rugby Final is one of the UK’s most celebrated sporting occasions, a day that brings together fans of all ages to witness the best of rugby. For 2025, Wilderness Agency was tasked with creating a campaign that would not only sell out the event but also attract new audiences, particularly younger fans who increasingly consume sport through digital channels.
The brief was ambitious: sell out the Final faster than ever before, and grow the 18–34 fanbase, embedding rugby more deeply within youth culture.
The campaign had two clear goals. The first was to achieve a faster sell-out than the 2024 Final, which sold out with three weeks to spare. The second was to grow rugby’s younger audience, especially digital-first fans aged 18–34. Both objectives reflected Premiership Rugby’s wider ambition to secure long-term loyalty from both established supporters and the next generation.
Wilderness designed a platform-first strategy that treated each channel as its own community. Rather than simply duplicate creative, content was adapted to audience behaviours and expectations.
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On Facebook, the focus was on older supporters who valued the tradition and spectacle of the event, with emotive storytelling highlighting the drama of the competition. Instagram targeted slightly younger fans with dynamic visuals and player-focused content. TikTok became the engine for younger engagement, using humour, trending sounds, and FOMO-inducing storytelling to position rugby as exciting, relevant, and accessible.
The campaign ran in three phases. Phase One built early awareness and momentum. Phase Two showcased the players, the atmosphere, and the overall event experience. Phase Three emphasised scarcity and urgency to maximise final ticket sales. This funnel approach ensured content moved audiences from awareness to engagement and ultimately to purchase.
Creativity was central to the campaign’s success. Wilderness developed a scrapbook-inspired aesthetic that provided both consistency and flexibility. The design was rolled out across social channels, Premiership Rugby’s website and app, outdoor placements, and television, ensuring that the campaign felt unified wherever audiences saw it.
More than 70 bespoke assets and multiple video variations were created. Agile production allowed Wilderness to react to real-time developments, including standout player performances and season storylines. This responsiveness kept content fresh and relevant.
The team also overcame content limitations, such as outdated imagery or restricted assets, by creatively reworking materials, commissioning new content, and collaborating with freelancers. This resourcefulness ensured that the campaign always had high-quality visuals capable of cutting through crowded feeds.
The breadth of the rugby audience was a major challenge. Passionate fans, casual sports followers, and those new to rugby all needed to feel included. Wilderness addressed this by tailoring creative to behaviours and demographics on each platform, ensuring resonance across the spectrum.
The long campaign timeline posed another challenge. Promoting a June event in winter risked audience disengagement. To overcome this, messaging was staggered: dedicated fans received strong early purchase prompts, while casual audiences were engaged gradually as excitement built.
Finally, there was the risk of campaign fatigue among stakeholders. Wilderness countered this by grounding decisions in data, showing that audiences were still responding positively and that core messaging remained effective. This evidence reassured stakeholders and allowed the campaign to remain consistent while delivering fresh executions.
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The results exceeded expectations. The 2025 Premiership Rugby Final became the fastest sell-out in history, with tickets gone six weeks before match day. Ticket sales outpaced the previous year significantly, with momentum building earlier and sustaining longer.
Across digital channels, the campaign reached millions of users and generated strong engagement. TikTok was particularly successful, with bespoke organic content achieving engagement rates several times higher than industry benchmarks. This demonstrated the campaign’s ability to connect with younger audiences in meaningful, culturally relevant ways.
Perhaps most importantly, Premiership Rugby saw significant growth in its fanbase, with almost one million new supporters aged 18–34 connecting with the sport during this period. This long-term impact reflects the campaign’s success not just as a ticketing initiative but as a growth driver for the sport as a whole.
The campaign is award-worthy because it united a broad and fragmented audience under one creative vision. It demonstrated that rugby can resonate not only with established fans but also with younger, digital-native audiences who experience sport differently.
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It also showcased adaptability. From repurposing limited content to pivoting strategy in response to real-time changes, the campaign remained fresh and effective throughout its run. This agility was only possible through close collaboration between Wilderness and Premiership Rugby, ensuring alignment across strategy, data, and creative delivery.
The 2025 Premiership Rugby Final Campaign represents a milestone in sports marketing. Wilderness combined creativity, insight, and agility to deliver record-breaking results: the fastest sell-out in Premiership history and unprecedented growth among younger fans.
This was more than a marketing campaign. It was a storytelling effort that captured the spirit of a season, drew new audiences into the sport, and celebrated rugby as a vibrant and inclusive part of UK culture. By delivering both short-term sales and long-term fan growth, Wilderness and Premiership Rugby proved that with the right strategy and creativity, even the most traditional sports can thrive in the digital age.
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