With the 2024 NWSL season nearly over, the Chicago Red Stars are looking ahead to the postseason. But come next season, Chicago will look a little bit different: The NWSL club announced Wednesday that the team will be called Chicago Stars FC, starting in 2025.
The change comes as the Red Stars bring in a new chapter, with the team coming under new ownership — led by Chicago Cubs co-owner Laura Ricketts — last summer. Chicago also welcomed a new head coach in former Jamaica manager Lorne Donaldson.
The rebrand will include a new crest and new merchandise featuring the design. The updated crest is more distinct from the Chicago flag, whose iconic blue-and-white stripes and red six-pointed stars inspired much of the Red Stars’ branding to begin with.
Chicago’s chief marketing officer Kay Bradley told The Athletic that the rebrand was something that Ricketts had in mind when she bought the team, and that it has been six months in the making.
“The wheels were turning, but obviously we didn’t want to rush it,” Bradley said. “This is a really big inflection point as we think about the course of the last 12 months of the club. It felt like the right time to signify the future, and all we believe that’s ahead of us from a progress perspective.”
But the new look isn’t just about a new era for the team, but for bringing back public awareness.
In a video posted to the Red Stars’ social media on Wednesday, the team made the intention of the rebrand clear: regaining recognition in the community.
“Hey, Chicago,” the video began. “You know this town. But do you know this team?”
The Red Stars have had the biggest turnaround in the league this season: After finishing dead last in the NWSL standings in 2023, the team has clinched a playoff spot this year. (Chicago is currently sixth in the NWSL standings, with one game remaining.) The team’s growing fanbase broke records this summer, with more than 35,000 fans showing up for a Red Stars matchup in Wrigley Field.
The new branding is intended to renew the Red Stars’ presence in a crowded Chicago sports base, and make it easier to identify as a team.
“How do we connect this club more closely to the city, if not in proximity, but in ethos and find that emotional connection?” Bradley says. “That was also the rationale for pulling stars out (of the last crest), pulling ‘Red’ out of the logo. Often people shorten our name to ‘Red Stars’, and then the ‘Chicago’ goes away. So by removing ‘Red’ from the name, the short version will be ‘Chicago Stars’, so that we keep that connection with our city.”
Per multiple reports, Chicago consulted players and fans in the run-up to the rebrand, asking them to help determine what to keep and what to change.
Chicago is now the latest of the original NWSL teams to undergo a rebrand. NJ/NY Gotham FC, originally Sky Blue FC, announced its rebrand in the 2021 offseason. Seattle Reign FC, which changed names twice in the past few seasons due to a location change and a sale to the OL Groupe, returned to its original name and (slightly updated) crest this season after another sale. (Other teams, such as the North Carolina Courage, rebranded following a move to another city or a return to the league.)