DannijoPro names health chief Pat Geraghty as CEO as NBA sales surge
DannijoPro, the fashion label licensed to make clothing for the National Basketball Association, the US men's professional basketball league, has appointed Pat Geraghty as chief executive to oversee operations and scaling.
The appointment was announced by the company. Geraghty will lead the next phase of growth for the brand, which was founded in 2024 by sisters Danielle and Jodie Snyder Women's Wear Daily.
Geraghty is not from fashion. He spent nearly 15 years as president and chief executive of GuideWell, the Florida-based health group, and its subsidiary Florida Blue, the Florida health insurer.
He said annual revenue at the two grew from $8 billion to $33 billion during his tenure. Before joining Florida Blue in 2011, he was president and chief executive of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, another US health insurer.
The Snyders know clothing. They founded Dannijo, their fashion accessories label, in 2008 before starting DannijoPro. Jodie Snyder said DannijoPro quadrupled sales over the past two years.
The numbers tell the pace. Sales at Madison Square Garden, the New York arena that is home to the Knicks, rose 150 percent year-over-year. During the NBA semifinals, the brand sold out of 800 satin bomber jackets priced at $395.
Then came the finals. Sales surged fivefold during the NBA Finals, according to the company. New York is the strongest market, followed by San Francisco and Los Angeles.
The focus so far is five NBA franchises: the Knicks, Warriors, Lakers, Celtics and 76ers. A licence, in this business, means permission to use team names and logos on clothing sold to fans.
DannijoPro has started to move beyond basketball. It is involved in tennis through the Laver Cup, the men's team event, and holds a licence from the National Football League, which runs US professional American football, for the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Production is split. The brand has manufacturing partnerships in Florida and New Hampshire, and also produces in China, Vietnam and Peru. Customisation requests sent by direct message accounted for about 30 percent of first-year business.
For fans, this means more team kit cut like fashion rather than standard fan wear. The founders built the early offer around direct requests, then added arena retail.
Geraghty also has an industry profile outside the company. He was the architect of the strategic restructuring that created GuideWell, and he was selected to serve as board chair for 2024 of America's Health Insurance Plans, the US health-insurers' trade group AHIP.
