At the Silicon Valley Chamber’s Mayors’ Roundtable last month, Santa Clara Mayor Lisa Gillmor put her finger on a top challenge facing South Bay cities in 2026: Getting their share of the hundreds of millions in promised economic activity from the upcoming Super Bowl and World Cup games.
“When I met one of our countries in the World Cup, Uruguay, I asked, ‘What are you looking for when you come to Silicon Valley?’ He says, ‘The first thing I noticed was that you’re far away from San Francisco,’” Gillmor recalled.
The 2016 Super Bowl at Levi’s Stadium brought $350 million worth of economic impact to the Bay Area, according to a study by Global Business Travel Association.
“San Francisco got 57% of the revenue spend,” said Chamber CEO Harbir Bhatia. “Santa Clara, the home of the stadium, got 7% and San Jose got 12% That should wake anybody up.
“Silicon Valley could have made a lot more,” she continued. “We cannot let that happen again. This is not about being San Francisco. This is about, let’s not leave the money on the table.”
To increase the South Bay’s share of the pie, the Chamber launched its “One Silicon Valley” campaign showcasing the region as a whole, through its Games Committee, the Visit Silicon Valley website, a Games magazine, an event map, social media and marketing promotion, a Games and Celebrations Hub website, coordinated regional transportation and Meet the Legends events.
The roundtable included the mayors of Cupertino, Milpitas, Mountain View, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale.
While there was plenty of aspirational talk about “showcasing” the region and “leveraging” international recognition, Milpitas Mayor Carmen Montano got down to brass tacks about making the games festive events for local residents, the vast majority of whom won’t be going to the games.
The energetic Montano is already rolling out an active event plan, including a livestreamed “Where in the World is Carmen Montano” geography adventure game.
“Big games are an economic engine for our cities,” said Montano, “and we do need that piece of that pie. Our city council has committed nearly $70,000 to invest and celebrate in the big games and show off our city attributes.
“We are currently creating a brochure showing where to shop, dine and attractions to visit, which we’ll have at the airports and on social media,” she continued. “We’re going to make it fun, and our residents are going to be fully involved, from symbolic lighting displays at City Hall to community watch parties to ‘Taste of Milpitas.’ Milpitas is known to have some of the best restaurants in the region, and we want to capitalize on that.”
The morning’s closing speaker, Earthquakes Hall of Famer Chris Dangerfield, gave his assessment of the U.S. team’s chances of advancing to the World Cup knockout ‘round of 16’ — “a good chance.”
But regardless of the U.S.’s performance on the field, the opportunities for Silicon Valley off the field are indisputable.
“There are,” he said, “tremendous advantages of having the games here. You have the exposure that you will get from the games being on TV, being shown from Levi’s Stadium, for viewing by the global audience. So it’s a very exciting time for the Bay Area, specifically for the Santa Clara area, for the greatest sports event in the world.”
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