At 81 years old, you may think the famous Billie Jean King has slowed down, but, oh boy, would you be wrong. ‘There’s still too much to do’, King says when asked whether she ever sits back and reflects on all her accomplishments – instinctively, she knew I wasn’t only talking about tennis.
Despite winning 39 Grand Slams (singles, doubles and mixed doubles), ranking number one in the world no less than five times, and triumphing over Bobby Riggs in arguably the most celebrated tennis match of all time, the 1973 Battle of The Sexes – the story of which was made into an Emma Stone and Steve Carell starring film in 2017 – it’s clear being a champion on the court wasn’t King’s core ambition. Without her, the world for women, particularly women in sports, would look very different.
‘Today’s players are living the dream of the Original 9 [the nine female tennis players who took a stand for equality in 1970]. They are making a living playing the sport they love,’ she tells me. We’re sat at her namesake tennis tournament, The Billie Jean King Cup, the largest annual international team competition in women’s sports with nations competing for a rather impressive prize pot. So impressive, in fact, it matches the men’s Davis Cup competition with $9.6 million (£7.61 million) in the purse.
Yet, King stresses this gender parity isn’t exactly a regular occurrence, particularly in sports other than tennis, and so she co-ordinated the Power of Women’s Sports Summit with the help of e.l.f. Beauty to give these core concerns a platform.
According to female athlete marketing agency Parity, 50% of women athletes reported zero or minus earnings after deducting expenses, 64% of athletes considered retiring in 2023 due to financial strain, and 74% worked another job outside of their athletic career. To add even further context to the issue, the 2024 Paris Olympics was the first of the events to have gender parity. Yet despite these female Olympians having a 14% larger social media following than male athletes, women’s sports receive only 15% of sports media coverage. And so, despite there being huge advancements in the sports field, just as in the wider world, there’s still quite a way to go.
Girls have 1.3million fewer opportunities to play high school sports than boys, yearly.
‘I knew I was a second-class citizen. Girls know very quickly that we’re second class, or worse,’ says King when asked why she’s focused so heavily on breaking down barriers. Outraged by the gender disparity in her sport over 50 years ago, she spearheaded the equal prize money movement, founded the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) and started the Women’s Sports Foundation, providing young girls access to sports and physical activity. ‘Girls have 1.3 million fewer opportunities to play high school sports than boys, yearly,’ she tells me, ‘which makes it much more’.
Yet none of this would have been possible without being a champion. ‘I thought to myself, maybe, just maybe, if I could be number one, maybe I could make this world a better place,’ she says. ‘I don't think I would want to swap my career journey with a player today. What we went through was much more of a learning, broadening and experience of a human. It wasn't just hitting tennis balls; we were blazing a trail. We had a vision for the future of the sport, and that was very important to me’. Yet, while this future is certainly brighter, King’s work is far from over.
The solution? ‘Investment’, says King, ‘and that doesn’t just mean financial’. At a company level, she stresses that brands marketing towards women need to boost them up. E.l.f. Beauty, a core partner of the Billie Jean King Cup and a co-host of the Power of Women’s Sports Summit was also the first-ever beauty brand sponsor at the Indy 500, is a founding partner of iHeart Women’s Sports Audio Network, a partner of the Toronto Maple Leafs ice hockey team, and supported Accrington Stanley Women FC on its first international tour.
The result? 23 consecutive quarters of growth for the beauty brand. And for the rest of us, King says all we need to give is time: watching women’s sports on TV, attending a game, or even shouting about of favourite players on social media. So, it truly is time to be more King.