Sports Illustrated Heads to Hulu as Minute Media’s Rich Routman Seeks Expanded Playbook
CANNES, FRANCE – Plenty of media companies arrive at Cannes Lions talking about efficiency, scale and optimization. Rich Routman, president of Minute Media, showed up talking about Sports Illustrated covers, swimsuit models, World Cup soccer and why nobody wants coverage of Argentina’s national team written from a cubicle in Manhattan.
Speaking with Beet.TV contributor Tameka Kee at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, Routman described a strategy for Sports Illustrated that can be summed up as: keep the iconic parts, move them to wherever audiences happen to be hanging out this year.
Keeping old franchises young
For a publication that has been around long enough to remember when sports highlights arrived the next morning instead of the next six seconds, Sports Illustrated is focused on adapting its best-known franchises to new formats.
“It’s less about trying to sit in somebody else’s skin,” Routman said. “It’s more about taking those franchises to differentiating platforms.”
That means taking properties once associated with magazine pages and transforming them into experiences, digital products and entertainment programming. The famous cover, Faces in the Crowd and the Power List are still part of the formula. They’re just showing up in different places.
Routman called SI “a very resilient brand” and argued that its longevity comes from remaining focused on what made it successful in the first place while adjusting to changing consumer habits.
“If we just continue to focus on the things that we do really well, but adapt them to how people are consuming media now, I think that we have a business that’s going to be for a long time,” he said.
The swimsuit issue gets a streaming glow-up
Perhaps the most visible example is Sports Illustrated Swimsuit’s move to Hulu.
For decades, the franchise generated magazine covers, beach photos and annual debates among people who insisted they only bought the issue for the journalism. Now it is becoming television.
According to Routman, Hulu approached SI about turning the event into a streaming experience, giving viewers access to behind-the-scenes moments and content that previously existed only for attendees.
“Our team was like, not initially, there was not even a hesitation whatsoever,” Routman said. “This is gonna be awesome.”
The partnership expands the reach of the event while giving fans a closer look at the production. It also illustrates a broader reality in media: if something attracts attention, eventually a streaming service will ask whether it can become a show.
Why World Cup coverage starts outside the U.S.
Another ambitious project involved a 48-cover Sports Illustrated World Cup initiative.
Routman argued that authentic soccer coverage requires a perspective that many American publishers struggle to achieve.
“The best coverage in soccer is from international into the U.S.,” he said.
Rather than covering global soccer through an exclusively American lens, Sports Illustrated partnered with local creators in individual markets. The goal was to create content that resonated with both U.S. fans and supporters in countries where soccer functions as a national obsession rather than an occasional summer pastime.
“The flavor of the content that we were able to get from somebody who lives and breathes that team in that culture is far different than someone who’s doing it from a New York office,” Routman said.
It is a simple concept that sounds obvious until one remembers how often global sporting events are analyzed by people whose primary qualification is having recently discovered where Slovenia is located.
Advertisers want more than scale
Routman also suggested that publisher conversations with advertisers have evolved significantly.
Five years ago, he said, publishers spent much of their time discussing audience size and Comscore rankings. Today, those discussions focus more on audience interests, content franchises, talent and platforms.
“We don’t even talk about the size of our audience anymore,” he said.
Instead, Minute Media is concentrating on innovation, experimentation and launching new products. Some initiatives work, some do not, but Routman said standing still is not an option.
“The buy side also, it’s like, ‘Rich, I just saw you six months ago. What’s new? Do I really need to meet with you again?'”
It is perhaps the most Cannes answer imaginable. In an industry that treats novelty like an Olympic sport, showing up with the same PowerPoint twice may be the only truly unforgivable offense.
A brand fueled by ambition
Routman, who described Sports Illustrated as an aspirational brand throughout his career, said one of the publication’s greatest assets is the passion of the people working on it.
Many of the ideas now being developed have existed inside the organization for years, waiting for the right moment. The challenge, he said, is not generating concepts but deciding which ones to pursue first.
“The brand is very ambitious,” Routman said.
That ambition appears to be producing a steady stream of projects, from Hulu productions to global soccer coverage. For a media brand that has survived decades of industry upheaval, the strategy seems refreshingly straightforward: respect the legacy, experiment aggressively and never underestimate the power of a good franchise.
After all, if Sports Illustrated can turn a swimsuit issue into a streaming show and a World Cup into 48 covers, somebody is probably already pitching a reality series about the people arguing over next year’s cover selection.
CANNES, FRANCE – Plenty of media companies arrive at Cannes Lions talking about efficiency, scale and optimization. Rich Routman, president of Minute Media, showed up talking about Sports Illustrated covers, swimsuit models, World Cup soccer and why nobody wants coverage of Argentina’s national team written from a cubicle in Manhattan.
Speaking with Beet.TV contributor Tameka Kee at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, Routman described a strategy for Sports Illustrated that can be summed up as: keep the iconic parts, move them to wherever audiences happen to be hanging out this year.
Keeping old franchises young
For a publication that has been around long enough to remember when sports highlights arrived the next morning instead of the next six seconds, Sports Illustrated is focused on adapting its best-known franchises to new formats.
“It’s less about trying to sit in somebody else’s skin,” Routman said. “It’s more about taking those franchises to differentiating platforms.”
That means taking properties once associated with magazine pages and transforming them into experiences, digital products and entertainment programming. The famous cover, Faces in the Crowd and the Power List are still part of the formula. They’re just showing up in different places.
Routman called SI “a very resilient brand” and argued that its longevity comes from remaining focused on what made it successful in the first place while adjusting to changing consumer habits.
“If we just continue to focus on the things that we do really well, but adapt them to how people are consuming media now, I think that we have a business that’s going to be for a long time,” he said.
The swimsuit issue gets a streaming glow-up
Perhaps the most visible example is Sports Illustrated Swimsuit’s move to Hulu.
For decades, the franchise generated magazine covers, beach photos and annual debates among people who insisted they only bought the issue for the journalism. Now it is becoming television.
According to Routman, Hulu approached SI about turning the event into a streaming experience, giving viewers access to behind-the-scenes moments and content that previously existed only for attendees.
“Our team was like, not initially, there was not even a hesitation whatsoever,” Routman said. “This is gonna be awesome.”
The partnership expands the reach of the event while giving fans a closer look at the production. It also illustrates a broader reality in media: if something attracts attention, eventually a streaming service will ask whether it can become a show.
Why World Cup coverage starts outside the U.S.
Another ambitious project involved a 48-cover Sports Illustrated World Cup initiative.
Routman argued that authentic soccer coverage requires a perspective that many American publishers struggle to achieve.
“The best coverage in soccer is from international into the U.S.,” he said.
Rather than covering global soccer through an exclusively American lens, Sports Illustrated partnered with local creators in individual markets. The goal was to create content that resonated with both U.S. fans and supporters in countries where soccer functions as a national obsession rather than an occasional summer pastime.
“The flavor of the content that we were able to get from somebody who lives and breathes that team in that culture is far different than someone who’s doing it from a New York office,” Routman said.
It is a simple concept that sounds obvious until one remembers how often global sporting events are analyzed by people whose primary qualification is having recently discovered where Slovenia is located.
Advertisers want more than scale
Routman also suggested that publisher conversations with advertisers have evolved significantly.
Five years ago, he said, publishers spent much of their time discussing audience size and Comscore rankings. Today, those discussions focus more on audience interests, content franchises, talent and platforms.
“We don’t even talk about the size of our audience anymore,” he said.
Instead, Minute Media is concentrating on innovation, experimentation and launching new products. Some initiatives work, some do not, but Routman said standing still is not an option.
“The buy side also, it’s like, ‘Rich, I just saw you six months ago. What’s new? Do I really need to meet with you again?'”
It is perhaps the most Cannes answer imaginable. In an industry that treats novelty like an Olympic sport, showing up with the same PowerPoint twice may be the only truly unforgivable offense.
A brand fueled by ambition
Routman, who described Sports Illustrated as an aspirational brand throughout his career, said one of the publication’s greatest assets is the passion of the people working on it.
Many of the ideas now being developed have existed inside the organization for years, waiting for the right moment. The challenge, he said, is not generating concepts but deciding which ones to pursue first.
“The brand is very ambitious,” Routman said.
That ambition appears to be producing a steady stream of projects, from Hulu productions to global soccer coverage. For a media brand that has survived decades of industry upheaval, the strategy seems refreshingly straightforward: respect the legacy, experiment aggressively and never underestimate the power of a good franchise.
After all, if Sports Illustrated can turn a swimsuit issue into a streaming show and a World Cup into 48 covers, somebody is probably already pitching a reality series about the people arguing over next year’s cover selection.
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