Fanatics, the Jacksonville-headquartered sportswear manufacturer and retailer, has appointed Deborah Crawford as senior vice president and head of investor relations.
In her new role, Crawford reports to Fanatics CFO Glenn Schiffman and oversees the firm’s investor engagement strategy while working on institutionalizing the company’s relationships with new and existing shareholders.
Crawford brings to the firm more than 25 years of experience in IR across several industries, including technology, media and entertainment. In her most recent role, she headed the IR function at Meta following her appointment in 2014. Before this, she established Netflix’s first formal IR function.
In an official statement, Schiffman says Crawford will play a crucial role in communicating the business strategy to the wider investment community as Fanatics continues ‘to grow and mature’.
‘Deborah has a strong track record of developing and executing comprehensive investor relations programs at scale for top-tier organizations. We are thrilled to welcome her to Fanatics as we continue to expand upon our investor relations program,’ he adds.
While Fanatics remains a private company, the initiation of the IR function could pave the way for a potential IPO; as Yahoo!Sports reports, this is ‘a long-stated goal of Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin.’
‘Throughout my career, I’ve always admired and been attracted to organizations at the forefront of their industry and, in my eyes, there could not be a more exciting company to join right now than Fanatics,’ says Crawford.
‘I look forward to working with Glenn and the extended leadership team to further solidify Fanatics’ position within the market with current and future investors.’
