Brands don’t get much bigger!
Manchester United are the most successful English Premier League (EPL) club having won the title 19 times last weekend surpassing Liverpool FC‘s record of 18 titles. It all began in 1993 when manager Sir Alex Ferguson ended a 26-year drought to lift the Premier League trophy and remarkably at that time United had only won the title seven times.
Manchester United has been described as a global brand with a 2009 report valuing the club’s trademarks and associated IP at £329 million and in 2010, Forbes magazine ranked Manchester United second only to the New York Yankees in its list of the ten most valuable sports team brands, valuing the club’s brand at $285 million (a staggering 16 percent of the club’s $1.835 billion value).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bO7y-Lv-PUE
So what does this all equate to when we start to look at the brands who sponsor the world’s most recognisable sporting club? Well with a reported 5 million plus viewers watching Manchester United each week (in England alone) it’s fair to say that brand recognition is of high priority in the minds of the movers and shakers running these global giants!
In an initial five-year deal worth ONLY £500,000, Sharp Electronics became United’s first shirt sponsor at the beginning of the 1982–83 season, a relationship that lasted until the end of 2000. Enter Vodafone! The global brand secured a four-year, £30 million deal and agreed to pay £36 million to extend the deal by four years.
At the start of the 2006–07 season, American insurance corporation AIG agreed to a four-year £56.5 million deal which in September 2006 became the most valuable in the world – but wait there’s more! At the beginning of the 2010–11 season, American reinsurance company Aon became the club’s principal sponsor in a four-year deal reputed to be worth approximately £80 million, making it the most lucrative shirt sponsorship deal in football history!
Building brand equity and recognition locally, nationally and globally is critical – fair to say that these mega brands agree!
Want your brand kicking goals and increase it’s awareness and equity in the market then give us a call.
Dominic Guthrie
Client Account Director and Manchester United fan!
So true about the value of the brand. It was even a question on Eddie McGuire’s Hot Seat last week i.e Manchester United being the most valuable brand.
Nice one Dom, I wonder whether pound for pound sporting brands may be the most powerful of all. If you could measure passion and loyalty, Man U would have to give that title a shake too.
It’s a great point you make Dave, maybe sporting brands are the most powerful of all. Man U are just so huge, everywhere you go, every corner of the globe the passion loyalty is massive!
Great post Dom. It seems that Aon stands to benefit from some excellent brand exposure. Aon just has to hope that the individuals involved with the club can uphold the brand values that Aon hopes to portray, unlike the unfortunate brand partnership of TAC and the Collingwood football club.
Thanks Kim and some great parallels you draw, although to be fair to the Collingwood football club, other AFL clubs and for that matter other sporting clubs have also let their brand partners down.
Thanks for your comment Maz and couldn’t agree more with you. I wonder what brand class Eddie would consider his beloved Magpies to fall into?