Custom Trading Card Activation for theScore Bet NFL Kickoff

To celebrate the start of the 2024 NFL season, theScore Bet hosted an exclusive kickoff party in Toronto and brought in Booth Empire to build a sports brand activation that would outlast the event itself.

Instead of a conventional photo experience, we designed a fully customized trading card activation. Guests entered their name and player number, chose from two branded card designs, posed for a professional photo, and walked away minutes later with a personalized NFL-inspired collectible - printed on-site, sealed in a magnetic one-touch case, and finished with a custom holographic theScore Bet sticker.

The result: a branded keepsake designed to be collected, displayed, and shared long after the event ended.

What theScore Bet Needed

theScore Bet needed an activation that would:

• Connect naturally with football culture and the NFL Kickoff theme
• Put theScore Bet’s visual identity at the centre of the guest experience
• Give guests creative control over the finished product
• Produce a premium physical keepsake - not a throwaway print
• Run at live-event pace without lines backing up
• Generate content guests would photograph and share organically

Custom trading cards checked every box. Trading cards carry built-in associations with sports, fandom, nostalgia, and collecting - and turning each guest into the featured athlete makes that connection personal.

The Custom Trading Card Concept

Booth Empire designed two NFL-inspired card layouts built entirely around theScore Bet’s brand - signature colours, logo treatments, and graphic language carried through the card artwork, the digital guest interface, and the finishing details.

Each guest personalized their card with:

• Their name
• Their preferred player number
• Their choice of card design
• Their own professional event photo

This structure gave attendees genuine creative ownership while keeping every card on-brand - a balance that matters when the client’s identity is the campaign.

Inside the Guest Flow

The workflow was built for speed and simplicity in a live event environment:

1. Personalize. Guests entered their name and player number through a custom-branded digital interface.
2. Choose a design. Two theScore Bet card layouts to select from.
3. Shoot. A professional photo captured in the branded photo area.
4. Produce. Guest details and photography were automatically composited into the selected card design and printed live.
5. Finish. Each card was sealed in a rigid magnetic one-touch 35pt case and topped with a custom holographic theScore Bet sticker.

From first tap to finished card, the process ran at live-event pace, keeping throughput high during peak periods.

Why the Finishing Matters

The physical presentation is what separates a collectible from a novelty print. Magnetic one-touch cases are the standard for protecting genuinely valuable sports cards - putting each guest’s card in one signals that this is something worth keeping. The holographic logo sticker adds a final layer of authenticity and brand permanence.

Those production decisions transformed the deliverable from “event photo” into “collector’s item,” which is exactly how guests treated it.

Optional AI Sports Trading Card Experience

Alongside the photographed cards, Booth Empire offered an AI sports photo booth experience: guests could see themselves transformed into football players, with their faces incorporated into custom athlete-inspired artwork.

This gave theScore Bet two distinct content streams from one activation - a premium physical collectible and an imaginative, highly shareable digital asset. For brands weighing physical versus digital engagement, this pairing delivers both without doubling the footprint.

What Guests Took Home

• Every guest left with a one-of-one branded collectible they helped create
• theScore Bet’s identity was woven into the creative process itself - guests actively built with the brand, not just in front of it
• Physical cards and AI-generated digital content extended the activation’s reach beyond the room

Unlike temporary decor or a standard photo print, the trading cards were designed for a long shelf life - on desks, in collections, and in social feeds.

For Agencies: Why Custom Trading Card Activations Work

If you’re building a campaign for a sports brand, sponsor, or fan-facing client, custom trading cards solve several briefs at once:

Guests become part of the campaign. Attendees aren’t observing an activation - they’re co-creating a personalized branded product, which drives longer dwell time and deeper brand recall.

The branding is integrated, not adjacent. Client colours, logos, campaign messaging, and sponsor partners live inside the card design itself.

Physical and digital content work together. A premium printed keepsake plus shareable digital assets from a single station.

Data capture is built in. Guest information entry can include consent and lead-capture workflows for post-event marketing.

The format adapts to almost any brief: professional sports events, fan festivals, product launches, sponsorship activations, athlete appearances, corporate celebrations, university orientations, retail promotions, awards programs, and employee recognition events.

Create a Custom Trading Card Activation for Your Event

Planning a sports brand activation, sponsorship campaign, or experiential marketing program in Toronto or anywhere in Canada?

Contact Booth Empire to discuss custom trading card production, AI experiences, branded card design, event capacity, and activation requirements.