Nationwide, just over a million children, mostly girls, participate in cheer each year (some estimates are even higher), more than the number who play softball or lacrosse. And almost every part of that world is dominated by a single company: Varsity Spirit. It’s hard to cheer at the youth, high school or collegiate level without putting money in the company’s pocket. Varsity operates summer camps where children learn to do stunts and perform; it hosts events where they compete; it sells pompoms they shake and uniforms they wear on the sidelines of high school and college football games. Varsity’s market power has made the cheer world a paranoid place. In the reporting for this article, dozens of people spoke about the company in conspiratorial tones better suited to a spy thriller.
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American cheerleading has never been bigger.
You have the sort of sideline, rah, rah, jumping up and down with pom poms type of cheerleading.
And then you have the competitive side that you see on screen, like in the movie Bring it on or the Netflix series Cheer.
There are hundreds of cheerleading competitions every year, and for the championships, which are broadcast on espn, thousands of people descend on a venue at Disney World that was built specifically for cheerleader.
The athleticism, female empowerment, American nostalgia, and glitzy pageantry have all combined to create a cultural phenomenon.
And for this week's Sunday read, I wanted to look into how the sport of cheerleading has become the business of cheerleading.
What I found is a single company that dominates this world.
Some critics call it a monopoly whose tactics mirror those of Google and Microsoft.
And the level of control that's wielded at the top is extraordinary.
My name is David Gavi Herbert, and I'm a contributor to the New York Times Magazine.
I write a lot about subcultures and business worlds that are dominated by singular figures or firms, and I try to unravel how those empires came to be.
It turns out that the sprawling and lucrative business of cheerleading is largely controlled by a Memphis based company called Varsity Spirit.
Varsity has grown over the last 50 years, first through the vision of a former cheerleader and entrepreneur named Jeff Webb, and then later through infusions of cash from private equity firms.
This summer, kkr, one of the largest private equity firms in the world, bought Varsity and its affiliate companies for nearly $5 billion.
My story is about the dangerous and expensive world that Varsity has presided over.
I spoke with cheerleaders who had suffered catastrophic injuries and who alleged abuse from coaches.
I spoke with cheer parents who told me about going deep into debt for the sport.