Kevin Durant is one of the best NBA players over the last 15 years. His incredible play has brought Durant a lot of fame and accolades. All of these achievements make him very attractive to different companies as a potential sponsor. What companies does Kevin Durant endorse? Durant endorses a variety in different markets like Alaska Airlines, Beats, Gatorade, Sprint and Google. His biggest endorsement deal is with Nike where Durant has his own signature shoe collection.
As it is with almost every NBA superstar, Durant’s most valuable endorsement is with Nike. Coming out of the University of Texas, Durant had a lot of suitors when he was looking to sign his first shoe deal as the second overall pick in 2007. Durant went with Nike in his rookie year, signing a seven year contract worth around $60 million.
During that first contract, Durant became a four time all star and NBA MVP in 2014, the same year that his contract with Nike was set to expire. When that contract expired, it began a bidding war for Durant’s endorsement between Nike and rival company Under Armour.
Under Armour approached Durant with a huge offer, but due to their previous agreement, Nike had the right to match it. It was more than enough to secure Durant and he signed a new 10 year deal with Nike that is supposed to be worth a maximum of $300 million as well as a $50 million retirement package.
Since then , Durant has released a new signature shoe almost every year and he often wears his own shoes on the basketball court. Durant has also been involved in a few different Nike adverts, using some of the criticism of his career decisions to help boost the sales of his signature shoe collection.
Since signing his initial deal with Nike he has released 14 different KD shoes with the KD14 coming out in spring 2021, with the 2021 shoe featuring a nod to his nickname of “The Slim Reaper”.
Durant is the third ever NBA player to reach 14 shoe collaborations with Nike, with only Michael Jordan and Lebron James reaching 14 shoe collaborations before KD. The deal has been a massively successful one with his sneaker line constantly being more affordable than other superstar collaborations.
This is the case for his 2022 shoe as the KD15 is around £70 cheaper than the Lebron 19, James 2022 shoe release. It seems both Nike and Durant have benefited from it massively as KD rakes in around $30 million per year from his deal with Nike. But this is certainly not his only major endorsement deal.
One of other endorsements which is very common with NBA players is the video game NBA 2K. Durant has been in the NBA 2K game since his rookie year and was involved with the advertisement of the game in 2015, featuring in the NBA 2K15 “We Got Next” advert that featured other NBA stars like Steph Curry, Paul George and Anthony Davis.
Another endorsement that Durant has which is common with NBA players is Beats. KD is one of the faces of the headphone company founded by Dr. Dre. The company became the official headphone and wireless speaker sponsor of the NBA in 2018 and endorsed several NBA stars including Durant.
He featured in a series of adverts with Beats alongside NBA superstars like Lebron James and James Harden. Before endorsing Beats, he used to advertise for rival company Skullcandy.
During his time with the Oklahoma City Thunder, Durant featured in a Gatorade commercial alongside Dwayne Wade. The advert is very well known by NBA fans as it shows the pair being the nightmare of each other. Since then, Durant has been a spokesperson for Gatorade.
Collectibles are very popular among NBA fans so it is no surprise that Durant endorses the largest sports collectible company in the world, Panini. During his time with the Thunder, Durant signed a multi-year exclusive deal with Panini as he became the global NBA spokesman for the company.
This deal began more than eleven years ago and Durant still produces autographed trading cards and memorabilia which was exclusive to Panini. He has also become a partner with Google, featuring in two different adverts for Google assistants, one of them alongside John Legend and Chrissy Teigen.
In 2015, a year before he joined the Warriors, Durant partnered with Sonic Drive-In for an advert about the fast food restaurant chain. He became one of the faces of the company and even had his own custom sonic slush flavour called “High flyer slush”.
While Durant has a lot of endorsements that are very similar to other NBA players, he made a big business venture in 2016 other than joining the Golden State Warriors. Durant started Thirty Five Ventures alongside his manager Rich Kleiman. It is an investment company that has been hugely successful for Durant and Kleiman.
Thanks to Thirty Five Ventures, Durant has started to do some branded content deals that can lead to Durant becoming a partner of the business. One of those partnerships is American Family Insurance which partnered with Thirty Five Ventures to produce an online series called Dream to Achieve.
You can say that Durant endorses any of the companies that Thirty Five Ventures invests in, as on the company website you can see the over 100 different companies that they have invested in. Durant is vocal about some of the more successful investments and this acts as endorsement for these companies.
Durant invested in Coinbase in 2017, a cryptocurrency platform that went public in 2021 and saw Durant make huge profits from their IPO. In late 2021, Durant signed a deal with the company to promote it through Thirty Five Ventures which is no surprise as Durant has a serious investment in the company.
Through his investments, Durant has also endorsed MLS team Philadelphia Union of which he is a minority owner. Through business investments, most of Durant’s endorsements have made him a partner instead of a spokesperson.