HOW DO ORGS EARN MONEY

Genuine question
I know they earn very little money from prizepools
Other than that how do they earn , im sure no one buys merch and shit , even if they do its prolly like only SEN , cant imagine someone with fking dfm merch
People say SEN is content org or some shit , how do they earn money from that . They pay streamers huge amount , their yt and whatever content probably makes nothing compared to how much they spend on the content and the CCs . Someone pls tell me how tf these orgs even earn 50% of what they spend

answer: they dont

Sponsorships and investors

Merch and shit, orgs get like 15-25% of the prizepool which is pocket change and sponsors.

Sponsorships and outside investment.
Some orgs make good money from merchandise (100t for example)
Some teams allow players to keep the prize pool earnings.

The majority of them don't.

Riot are also paying all the VCT partnered teams.

They don't make money that's the thing. Most esports orgs only hope is basically to break even, only the biggest orgs in the biggest esports with the most success with the most sponsorships ever will be even slightly profitable. The amount of money ppl were spending on orgs was ridiculous in the first place for incredibly diminishing returns, for a lot of teams their funding was 90% from rich millionaires and VC firms who thought esports was the next big thing, and now that the bubble burst and the money is being pulled orgs will need to be incredibly stingy with their budgets.

they dont

APAC orgs and EU based influencer orgs seem to be making a profit through dedicated fanbases, willing to buy merch and engage with social media content.

Orgs like Fnatic and Liquid are most likely sustainable, but do rely on venture capitalists in some sense.

NA orgs aren't sustainable, they all rely on burning through the pockets of someone with so much money they don't know what to do with it. NA salaries are so inflated, its impossible to see and ROI.

https://www.hltv.org/news/36366/ence-reports-nearly-1-million-in-profits-in-2022

They are mostly funded other than very few teams such as some content creator teams and 100T make profits from merch sale,collabs and internet engagement such as youtube

Onlyfans

most of the orgs are in loss

mainly sponsors, like crypto, betting (esp eu orgs), and some vc money.

if they have side businesses like merch, web content or apps, etc but i dont think they earn a lot from those.

Org dont earn money as most suffer losses

revenue streams are -
sponsorships
in game items
merch
prize money(including sticker money or champs bundle money)
rev share with partner events
buyouts of player (though they would buy players from other orgs so this is not consistent source of rev)
youtube/social media (but most org have bad social media and spend more than they earn)