Marissa Solis: ‘If you’d told me five years ago that Bad Bunny was performing at the Super Bowl, I’d never have believed it’

She manages billions of dollars, decides how the biggest sporting spectacle on the planet is staged, and engages audiences exceeding 300 million people. During the Super Bowl, she generates tens of millions of dollars in advertising revenue for that game alone, with 30-second spots costing over $7 million each. Behind these staggering figures is the commitment of Marissa Solis (Mexico City, 1972) to transforming the NFL into a global passion.

This is the story of a little girl who always believed her mother, not those who called her a “wetback” at school. That migrant girl who dreamed of being an ambassador is now the NFL’s Senior Vice President of Global Brand and Consumer Marketing. Being at the top hasn’t changed her, and Bad Bunny is still the young man she hired a decade ago for an ad, the one who, just days before his halftime show performance at the most anticipated game of the year, brings tears of pride to her eyes. Together, they are making history in American sports and around the world.

Question. The Super Bowl is coming up. For you, I imagine it will be more stressful than preparing for a world political summit.

Answer. For me, February 8, at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, will be more of a wedding-like stress. We’re planning one of the biggest events in the world. There’s a lot of pressure, but we’re very excited. More than 300 million people will watch the show live, in many languages, all over the world.

Q. President Donald Trump’s comments about Bad Bunny, who is scheduled to perform at the halftime show, haven’t been very flattering. How have you handled it?

A. Hiring [Bad Bunny] was very intentional. We always choose the artist who is most influential in the culture, because of their involvement and social commitment. What Bad Bunny has done to uplift his people, Puerto Rico, his refusal to perform in the United States until now… He’s going to perform for 13 minutes and in Spanish. There has been a lot of controversy, but we made a commitment to him and we’ve never regretted it. People keep asking how it’s possible that the NFL would choose a Latino artist. And after all, I can say that if we were proud before, now we’re twice as proud.

Q. I see you get emotional when you talk about him.

A. For me, it’s like closing a very important circle in my life. I met Bad Bunny when I was at Pepsi and he was still Benito. He had barely released his first album. [At Pepsi], I was given the responsibility of creating a business unit specifically dedicated to serving the Hispanic community. We were the first company in the world to do so. Then we did a Cheetos campaign with him, and now, 10 years later, he’s going to perform at the Super Bowl. I was recently with him filming a documentary in San Juan. It was also very exciting to see him at his first concert there. That concert was a love letter to Puerto Rico. And I’m not just talking about commercial music: it’s so much more than that.

Q. How does it feel to achieve this goal?

A. If you had told me just five years ago that Bad Bunny would perform at the Super Bowl, I would never have believed it. I also never imagined we would reach more than 40 million Latino fans in the U.S. The image I see for the coming years is global expansion. We’ve already announced games in Australia, Rio de Janeiro, Munich, and London... My dream is to reach one game per week during the season, that is, 17 or 18 games a year in different parts of the world. I know I wasn’t an ambassador like I dreamed of being when I was young, but the impact of my work — beyond the business side — is to demonstrate that, regardless of who is president or what conflicts exist, this will continue to be a sport that unites, not divides.

Q. What do you remember about the girl who came from Mexico to Texas?

A. I lost my dad when I was six. I remember it as a very difficult time. But even then, I dreamed of coming to the United States; I always thought it was the land of light. I remember writing letters to my deceased father and telling him about it. I grew up in Harlingen, Rio Grande, right on the border. From there, we came to Brownsville, Texas. I arrived with the same hopes I saw in the movies. But it’s interesting: right in one of the states where most people are of Latino or Hispanic descent and born in the U.S., I encountered a lot of prejudice. At school, they called me “wetback,” and I would ask my mom why; I always went to school with dry clothes.

Q. How did your mother explain it to you?

A. Then-president Jimmy Carter left office and Ronald Reagan arrived at the White House, and what we see today regarding immigration, racism, and prejudice, I experienced firsthand. What saved me was my stepfather’s restaurant. I cleaned, I was a waitress, and that’s where I developed a strong work ethic and a sense of effort. And from my mother, I learned to ignore what people said to me, to focus on studying. At that time, at school, they divided us into three groups: gold (the brightest students), silver (almost everyone else), and brown… They could have chosen “bronze,” but no. I was in that “brown” group, the one for the kids who had difficulty speaking English. From then on, I resolved not to have an accent, no matter what. But at the same time, I remember asking my parents for things in English because I was embarrassed for other kids to hear me, and they wouldn’t answer me until I said it in Spanish. That is something I will be eternally grateful for, because Spanish opens doors all over the world.

Q. When did you begin to feel like you were American?

A. Much later. As a teenager, a teacher told me about Georgetown University in Washington, but the problem was how to pay for it. Every year, Coca-Cola selected 50 students from across the country, and in 1991 I received a full scholarship to study there. When I graduated with a degree in international relations, I passed the diplomacy exam, and just when I had decided to leave, a professor — the second one I remember who guided my life — told me not to waste my time because becoming an ambassador was very difficult. He wisely recommended that I enter the corporate world and make a name for myself. That’s how I got a job at Procter & Gamble in Puerto Rico. I never studied finance, but I specialized in developing-country economics.

Q. And then you went on to become a top executive at PepsiCo before joining the NFL.

A. It was difficult to leave Pepsi, but obviously I couldn’t say no. And while I never became a diplomat, this job requires a lot of diplomacy: between players, countries, fans, teams, the expansion of football to other countries. It’s exciting and very complex. When I was hired in 2021, coming out of the pandemic, the NFL was embroiled in a lot of controversy. The mission, at that time, for Roger Goodell and Tim Ellis was clear: we needed to change the face of the league.

Q. How do you balance the sports side with the spectacle of the Super Bowl halftime show?

A. There are two very important things about American football: it never goes out of style and it’s unpredictable. There’s a lot of strategy, thousands of plays, and any team can win the league. That’s what always remains. Then there’s everything associated with what’s trendy today. That’s where my team and I come in. Everything that happened after Taylor Swift started going to stadiums to watch games — I can humbly say I didn’t see it coming — was a turning point for our brand. Thanks to her, we saw the narrative that resonates with women, young people, and other communities. That’s where our strategy began, which we called “helmet off,” so that people could see what’s behind each player: that they’re not just gladiators, but also fathers, brothers, sons, and boyfriends. It’s no longer just the game; it’s life, humanity, inspiration.

Q. And the Latin American players arrived too.

A. There are currently 80 active Latinos in the NFL. Their stories and the Latin American flags they proudly display have caused our audiences to grow exponentially, including among Generation Alpha and women. It’s incredible how American football is changing. We also see that the majority of young people under 25 are Latino. And they don’t consume the sport the same way as traditional fans. They’ll never watch a four-hour game straight through, and that’s why we have to tell stories and create content that connects. There are 18 weeks of games, but the events last all year. That’s also where the strategy of expanding the sport to other countries comes from.

Q. The Santiago Bernabéu stadium in Madrid, for example, was filled to capacity for American football recently.

A. We want to be among the top three sports in every country in the world. In the United States, we’re number one. In Mexico and Canada, we’re already well-positioned, and in England and Brazil, we’re among the top 10. We’ve made a lot of progress. But according to a study we conducted in Spain, we were lagging behind even darts competitions. So, what happened in Madrid was spectacular. Partnering with Real Madrid was a brilliant move. While I was watching the game in Madrid, I was talking to the manager of a restaurant at the Bernabéu, and he told me he’d never seen anything like it. From the players’ entrance to the national anthems — the Spanish and the American — it was all pure emotion.

Q. Are you worried that the anti-Trump political climate in Europe will affect the NFL?

A. American football is not a political sport. Our sport unites people. In Madrid, Miami Dolphins and Washington Commanders fans were sitting together, hugging, celebrating, drinking beer. I can’t imagine that among Real Madrid and Barcelona fans.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition