As the fourth iteration of the BravoCon fan convention kicked off in Las Vegas on Thursday night, thousands of women, and some men, poured into the PH Live Theater lobby at Planet Hollywood bubbling with excitement, chattering and dressed to the nines. Bar lines spilled over as the frenetic crowd filled the theater in pursuit of their seats. They were greeted by a set filled with kitschy Vegas motifs: pink curling feathers, rolling dice, a martini glass and a major-sized neon “Mazel” sign.
Soon that stage — which has been the home to Jennifer Lopez, Britney Spears and John Legend throughout the last decade — would be occupied by a different kind of pop star: the Real Housewife, 29 of them, actually, glammed and ready to go in sequins, stilettos and icy gazes with cocktails in hand. At the center of it all, their wizard and host for the evening, Andy Cohen.
Appropriately, this particular broadcast, “BravoCon Live with Andy Cohen: The Days of Our Wives: 20 Years of The Real Housewives,” a toast to the franchise that put the Bravo network on the map back in 2006, was the shotgun start to three days and nights of jam-packed panels, premieres, photo ops and broadcasts from BravoCon 2025.
From Nov. 14 to 16, “Bravolebs” from shows such as Below Deck, The Valley, Vanderpump Rules, Next Gen, Married to Medicine and every Real Housewives city and more will immerse fans in the “Bravoverse,” both in person and streaming live on Peacock. Bravoholics will shop the Bravo Bazaar, explore the Bravoland Museum and take part in more than 75 events meant to indulge their reality-fandom.
Behind the scenes, a small cadre of NBCUniversal executives from marketing, sponsorships, content, talent and public relations — and their teams — under the leadership of Frances Berwick, chairman of Bravo & Peacock unscripted, have worked nonstop for the last 11 months to pull off this feat.
While fan conventions are nothing new, ranging from Comic-Con to Star Trek, a gathering as large as this to celebrate a collection of one network’s shows is unheard of.
“Listen, nobody’s going to CBS-Con,” Cohen tells The Hollywood Reporter days before the event. “People don’t say ‘I’m going to go home and watch CBS.’ People say, ‘I’m going to go home and watch Bravo.’”
The Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen host joined Bravo in 2004 as the vice president of original programming and was one of the execs instrumental in bringing the Real Housewives into millions of homes across the country. He left the network in 2013 and now serves as executive producer for all of its editions, ranging from Orange County to Dubai, and hosts the reunion shows. And he’s a Bravoleb in his own right, thanks to his late-night talk show.
“The truth is that the germ of the idea [behind BravoCon] has existed for many years. We used to have off-sites every year, and in the early 2000s, we would talk about doing it around Top Chef with little ancillary buckets related to our other shows. We weren’t calling it BravoCon then, but the idea of it was there,” Cohen recalls. “It was never something we were truly serious about until 10 years ago, and we started small. We did a beta test in New York [in 2019] and another [in 2022], and now what you’re seeing are the fruits of that testing. We’ve created a happy place for many people who love this brand. Vegas is everybody getting on a plane to put on the greatest circus we possibly could. For me, it’s like being Mickey Mouse at Disney World. There will never be a moment when I feel more like Elvis.”
Berwick, who joined the network in 1996 and took over as its head in 2010, says the BravoCon light bulb switched on after she witnessed an early outing with the Vanderpump Rules cast.
“I remember when Jenn Geisser’s [executive vice president of communications for Bravo and Peacock unscripted] team did a pub crawl with the Vanderpump Rules cast. This was after we’d only done two seasons, and it was absolutely mobbed,” she says. “We realized we bit off more than we could chew. We were taking talent around to three different bars in the West Village, and it was very oversubscribed. We started to get the impression that something like this would work.”
Sezin Cavusoglu, senior vice president of unscripted current production at NBCUniversal, has been producing shows for Bravo since 2009. Her first on the network was Real Housewives of New Jersey in an era she characterizes as the “table flip heard around the world that put Jersey on the map in a big way.” She now oversees all the creative for BravoCon’s main stage, the five shows Cohen is taping at PH Live and the Bravoland museum.
“I remember when we first started talking about BravoCon in spring 2019. That summer, for New York Pride, we had a float filled with Bravo talent.” Cavusoglu says. “There was such a jovial, fun feeling of ‘wow, look what happens when you put all these people together.’ The fans were losing their minds, screaming at everyone as we marched down Fifth Avenue. The planning for BravoCon actually ramped up right after that.”
Berwick recalls how in 2019 they did the first BravoCon across three different venues. “It was incredibly successful and one of the most joyous weekends,” she recalled. “People were so happy with it. They had no expectation. After that, we did a post-mortem and consumer research, and what we came back with was a tremendous outpouring of love for the brand. That really cemented it. The first one sold out in minutes for about 10,000 people. Then we focused on how to scale this.”
In 2022, BravoCon moved to the Javits Center, which Berwick says was challenging due to the “disproportionate amount of bathrooms for men that we didn’t need,” and then in 2023, Las Vegas, a no-brainer for the “proximity of Caesars Forum to a range of different hotels for different budgets.” And let’s not forget the glam — a city like Las Vegas might not even be a match for this amount of setting powder and lip gloss required to fuel this event.
“I can’t tell you how many glam squads are involved in bringing in almost 160 people who all like to look their best at all times — that’s the infrastructure that goes along with BravoCon,” she says.
Berwick delights in both the community that fans the casts have formed as a result of what she calls a “love fest” for audiences and talent.
“People now look forward to meeting up with friends they met at BravoCon. There are an amazing number of mash-ups among the cast because they all enjoy meeting each other. Some of them watch each other’s shows. Some don’t. But there is a shared experience,” she says. “We’ve created a beautiful, joyous event and experience and as a result, we are thoughtful about our choices around the shows.”
Cavusoglu uses her deep knowledge of the shows and talent to put together the panels. “We have a strong sense of what our fans want,” she says. For example, BravoCon attendees will get an exclusive first look at the premiere of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, followed by a Q&A with Lisa Vanderpump. Cavusoglu also masterminded an editor’s panel.
“Let’s teach people what editing is about and how editors help shape our show to demystify some of the editing process, and help end the vilification of editors,” she says. “There’s such a misconception about what editors do behind the scenes. I’m really hoping that this panel can shed light and make the process a little bit more transparent for the fans.”
The panels begin on Friday with The Valley and end on Sunday with Next Gen NYC, two new generation shows. “These are the future of our network. It’s great to be able to bring these casts into the BravoCon-verse,” she says.
The legacy and future of the shows became even more important when, earlier in the year, Comcast began spinning off the majority of its networks into a new company. They kept Bravo, and NBCUniversal now comprises the NBC broadcast network and stations along with the Peacock streaming service, Bravo, NBC News Group, NBC Sports and the Universal theme parks and resorts and Telemundo, Film and TV Studios. Bravo has been a driving force behind Peacock’s success.
“We’ve developed a whole new audience for Bravo than was watching just on linear. With the next day availability of the content on Peacock, that’s opened it up to a much broader, younger audience,” Berwick says.
That audience, in turn, wants more experience. “That has informed things like watch parties with talent. Last year, we held a Bravo Fan Fest in Miami, a miniature version of BravoCon. That worked well as a stopgap until the next BravoCon. It’s a heavy lift for us to do BravoCon every year,” Berwick says.
This year, BravoCon will live-stream its Bravoverse Live Stage panels on Peacock, with its Gold and Glam stage content available the next day.
“In the past, we have not streamed all the panels on Peacock, but we want to make this broadly accessible,” Berwick says. “If you come in person, there’s an intimacy, a camaraderie. But we also wanted to open it up to people who don’t have the resources or can’t travel, so they can experience it. And aren’t just reading headlines, but can watch for themselves.”
For Alison Levin, president of advertising and partnerships, and a self-proclaimed Bravoholic, the engagement and reach of BravoCon’s in-person experience isn’t something she’s witnessed before.
“It’s an intersection for fans, talent and brands to come together in a way they never have before, to reach this highly engaged, affluent female audience,” Levin says. “This year, BravoCon has 22 sponsors, 15 of them new, nine custom builds, which is up 125 percent year over year, and 32 talent partnerships, up 33 percent year over year. Fans are 66 percent more receptive to endorsements made by Bravolebs versus an average TV personality.”
According to Levin, three central components bring BravoCon to life for fans and sponsors. “The lead up to the event, the event itself and then all the extensions on the event — digital or social. Thirteen brands launched pre-BravoCon campaigns, including custom content with Jake from State Farm and Craig from Southern Charm, and we have Amanda [Bautula], Ariana [Madix] and Dorit [Kemsley] with custom video for Unilever,” she says.
Wayfair is bringing immersive rooms designed by the Housewives that highlight their style, and fans can shop for items featured in those experiences. Melissa Gorga’s will feature Sprinkle cookies. Heather DuBrow will showcase spa bathrooms.
“Fans can walk into those spaces, and they can shop in those spaces, and it will also exist on wayfair.com,” Levin says. The Bravo Bazaar features 30-plus talent-led businesses.
Jennifer Storms, chief marketing officer at NBCUniversal Television & Streaming, leads strategy, integrated marketing, media and consumer engagement for all NBCUniversal entertainment content and sports, including content and brand marketing for Peacock. She originally came into the fold via NBC Sports.
“One might not think that a woman with a heavy sports background would have a really good connection to come into a position like this, but it’s the perfect translation from sports to Bravo. A lot of our fans describe it as their Super Bowl,” Storms says. “The preparation, excitement and energy around a Super Bowl is not dissimilar to what we’re doing here with BravoCon. In sports, we work with leagues, teams and athletes. This is real life. This is happening in real time. There’s nothing scripted. These are real people, whether it’s on the field of play or a Beverly Hills Housewife; they have a lot of similar traits.”
And like sports, they have their fandoms.
“People say, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m a VPR and I can’t wait for the new season, new cast.’ And then you have others that say ‘I’m an OG of the OC,’” Storms asserts.
“There was a survey that went out after the last BravoCon,” Levin adds. “Eighty percent of people who went said it was the best weekend of their lives, ahead of the birth of their child and their wedding. I’m not sure what else you would compare that to.”
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