On a night featuring an elaborate drone show over Grandscape in The Colony, Los Angeles-based Cosm opened the doors to its larger-than-life 87-foot-diameter LED dome for a select group of sports, media and business industry professionals from around the United States.
The 65,000-square-foot venue is nearly incomparable to anything else with its gigantic, all-encompassing screen which towers three floors high. Cosm hosted a private showing of UFC 305 Saturday night, and it’s the first of many events that the company hopes redefines the future of the growing experiential entertainment business.
At this point last year, the bold project, a collaboration between Cosm and Dallas-based HKS Architects, was visually barely more than mere piles of dirt and a grand vision from president and CEO Jeb Terry and chairman Steve Winn.
But with the building finished, winning over potential customers like sports fanatics, art aficionados and more is the name of the game.
“Cosm is the next generation of the sports and entertainment experience and I promise that it will actually blow your mind,” Terry said in a speech to the 250-plus attendees. “My hope is that you feel what’s going on. You feel it in your bones. My expectation is that you’re gonna have no idea how to describe what you experienced.”
The idea behind Cosm is to fully immerse customers into experiences like being courtside at sporting events like the NBA Finals and Stanley Cup, artistic experiences like Cirque du Soleil and a new generation of educational material like director Guy Reid’s new film, Orbital.
“I feel a sense of joy, relief and excitement. This has exceeded the highest expectation we had,” Winn said. “Like anything else, there’s always a few things that don’t work exactly right. But this one has been near flawless execution. That all goes back to Jeb and his team. I couldn’t be happier tonight.”
Since last year, Winn, who lives in Texas and Terry, a Dallas native, have said the Lone Star State is embedded deep in the company’s DNA. But to get the most out of a setting like Grandscape and Dallas-Fort Worth, tapping into the company’s Texas roots is critical.
The company has hired Julian Rodarte, executive chef of Trinity Groves Mexican restaurant Beto & Son, to curate the venue’s menu. Showcasing food and drinks for Texans is a key retaining customers, Terry said.
“We tell our team that our technology will wow. But our hospitality will win. We are only as good as that last mile of service,” he said. “We’re not white tablecloth. But we want you to have food made from scratch that is unique to this market.”
Making the venue feel unique to Texas was also a deliberate goal, said HKS Architects vice president Andrew Schluterman. The company is responsible for designing venues such as SoFi Stadium, U.S. Bank Stadium and Arlington’s very own AT&T Stadium.
“There’s a lot of architectural differences. You look at the Los Angeles venue and it has the white stucco and fits into Hollywood Park. It’s very LA,” Schluterman said. “You come here, you see the very large limestone wall that greets you as you enter. Then when you enter, you see the tech center. We intentionally separate and craft our environments to fit the place they belong.”
Keeping ticket prices affordable as well as building an experience that can be shared by families is one of the keys for getting the most out of the project, Terry said. Ticket prices will hover around $30 for most events, he said. But there will be VIP-like experiences that can range from around $70 to over $100.
Putting together Cosm was no small feat. Though Winn and Terry declined to share how much it cost to built the venue, the company has spent millions to acquire computer graphics, interactive technology and video companies since 2020.
Explaining the concept to investors and the public has always been difficult, Terry said.
“When you’re standing on the edge of the cliff, it can be scary. We were staring into a lot of unknown,” he said. “We were confident. But we were also nervous and there was anxious moments. But when people came in and were blown away by what they saw, even in our prototypes, that gave us the conviction to do this.”
Cosm, now valued at over $1 billion, stands as one of the only companies in its space and knows it’s only a matter of time before challengers open their own immersive experiences.
“There’ll be competition. This is too big of a play and too big of an opportunity, but it hasn’t emerged yet,” Winn said. “The [Las Vegas] sphere is probably the closest competitor we have. But they primarily do music and art. It’s also very expensive to build places like these. We’re not going to see these in every location.”
There’s more on the horizon for Cosm. Beyond eyeing its next location in Atlanta, adding to its extensive media rights portfolio and gaining additional investments are the next steps for growth.
Even at Grandscape, the company wants to be bigger. More sports may come in the future, but adding artistic and educational material is a big goal going forward.
“The basis for the economics of this place is you want to be open 16 hours a day, 365 days a year, so you don’t rely on sports content to fill the calendar,” Winn said. “It’s not a return on an investment, it’s a return on imagination. Museums are not as interesting anymore to a lot of people, and we hope we can inspire the youth here.”
The Colony Mayor Richard Boyer, one of the masterminds behind Grandscape, is already looking to have Cosm partner with local schools and more for experiences like field trips. He’s even considering bringing his daughter to Cosm for her upcoming birthday.
“We’re so proud to have this here. So much remains to be seen because people don’t understand what this is yet. But this is going to be such a draw for us,” he said. “Traffic here at Grandscape is insane on weekends. But I think this is going to help us draw that weekday traffic. Then, if we can fill the space from here to Nebraska Furniture Mart with attractions and retail venues, the sky’s the limit.”
Cosm opens Aug. 31 with a batch of Week 1 college football matchups pitting Clemson vs. Georgia, Texas A&M vs. Notre Dame and USC vs. LSU. Tickets can be purchased through Cosm’s website and app on the App Store and Google Play Store. Tickets inside the dome for those college football matchups start at $77.
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