North Carolina FC teams up with rapper J. Cole. Look for Dreamville jerseys in March.
This story was updated on Thursday, February 27, 2020 at 4:25 p.m.
Building marketing momentum ahead of their 2020 season, the North Carolina Football Club announced a partnership with famed rapper J. Cole on Thursday, and introduced a jersey with the N.C. artist’s Dreamville Festival displayed on the front.
North Carolina FC owner Steve Malik, general manager Curt Johnson and head coach Dave Sarachan brought out five players to show off the new jerseys, and to offer an update on the ambitious Downtown South soccer stadium development proposed south of downtown Raleigh.
“The conversations with [Dreamville] began around getting to know one another, their team and our team, and then it quickly transferred to our visions for the community ... to the southern part of Raleigh and the development opportunity there,” Johnson said. “We centered on a partnership with Dreamville Festival with North Carolina native J. Cole leading the charge.”
The annual festival, headlined by Grammy-winning J. Cole, debuted last spring and will be held again on April 4 at Dorothea Dix Park. Johnson said it’s expected to bring more than the approximately 40,000 concertgoers who attended the festival last year.
Fans buying jerseys before March 6 will receive free tickets to the season’s first game on March 7 at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary.
Downtown South update
Speaking at a preseason press conference, Malik alluded to hosting music festivals like Dreamville once an entertainment district like Downtown South is built. He pointed out of a 10th-floor window toward southern Raleigh and the land for the project.
“The next step is to submit rezoning, which we are very close to doing,” Malik said in a follow-up interview. “We’ve been going through a master planning process and we have to have all of that set before we apply. Everything else depends on that schedule.”
The developer purchased 88 acres of a targeted 130 last December for the soccer stadium and mixed-use development cluster. Malik said the project will break ground next year if all goes as planned.
“I sort of feel like a quarterback looking at the line and reading the defense a little,” he said. “We have some choices. We have more options than things up in the air. We’re going to move forward.”
Malik said the zoning process for the potentially $2 billion project could take six months to a year while they figure out acquisition details for the remaining land, which is already under contract to be sold.
“In a public-private partnership like we’re doing, there are a lot of different variables,” he said. “The greenway, transit, affordable housing, getting that feedback from the city — all of that plays in.”
This story was originally published February 27, 2020 at 3:53 PM.
