Sports Construction
KC Royals, Hallmark Join Forces on $3B Stadium Redevelopment Plan
Kansas City Royals team plans to build $1.8B stadium in Missouri city's Crown Center neighborhood.
The Kansas City Royals plan to stay in Kansas City, Mo., and build a $1.8B stadium in the city's Crosstown neighborhood.
Two iconic Kansas City, Mo.-based enterprises, the Kansas City Royals and Hallmark Cards, are teamed on a $3-billion multi-use development that would feature a new $1.8-billion stadium for the Major League Baseball team, a new headquarters for the greeting card, art supply and media company and retail, entertainment and public space.
The Royals would build the new stadium on 85 acres in Kansas City’s Crown Center neighborhood, south of the downtown district. The team would leave its current home, Kauffman Stadium, by 2031 when its lease expires.
Populous is lead architect/designer for the stadium; a contractor has not yet been named. Hallmark has not yet announced an architect or contractor for its new headquarters, which is planned to replace an existing one in Crown Center.
The total project would be funded by the Royals and other private investors and by Kansas City and the state, which passed Missouri’s Show-Me Sports Investment Act in 2025. It allows for bonds to cover up to 50% of the cost of new or renovated stadiums in the state, along with up to $50 million of tax credits per stadium and other aid from local governments.
While the National Football League's Kansas City Chiefs, who currently occupy Arrowhead Stadium, plan to build a new stadium across the Missouri-Kansas border, Royals CEO and Chairman John Sherman said that the team's founder, pharmaceutical entrepreneur Ewing Kauffman, would approve of the plan to remain in the team's Missouri hometown.
“Our founder Ewing Kauffman wanted the Royals to be Kansas City forever, and he wanted the team to benefit his hometown as much as possible,” Sherman said in a press release. “Joining Hallmark with this project achieves both and extends the Hall family’s critical legacy of helping Kansas City grow.”
Hallmark Cards Executive Chairman Don Hall Jr. added: “Every time a fan walks through the stadium doors, they’ll be standing in a place shaped by Kansas City and Hallmark’s creative spirit."
The Chiefs announced in December a plan to move across the state border to a new $3-billion domed stadium in Kansas City, Kan., in Wyandotte County, with a target opening for the 2031 football season, along with a new team headquarters and practice facility in Olathe, in Johnson County, Kan. The overall plan also includes roughly $1 billion in mixed-use development across both sites.
A Sports Complex Redevelopment Task Force convened by Jackson County—which owns the Truman complex, where the Royals' and Chiefs' current stadiums are located—has begun meeting to plan the future for the 400-acre site.
The moves by both teams have been spurred by a common theme in stadium construction for professional sports teams—aging infrastructure, a desire to create revenue by providing more luxury suites and other high-end amenities and to anchor surrounding mixed-use districts.
