Brands In Soccer

The True Value Of Brands In Soccer

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In 1992 a London retailer named Edward Freedman moved north to take a job that hadn’t previously existed: head of merchandise at Manchester United. The club already had a global brand — an image that meant something to people — yet had never previously sold much stuff. Back then, fans could buy little more than a United scarf and shirt. Pirate vendors were selling self-made T-shirts just meters outside Old Trafford, but not a penny of those revenues went to the club. United then was a small local business.

Freedman had an insight that would change soccer: People liked United’s brand so much that they would pay to attach themselves to it. Soon a megastore the size of a supermarket opened at Old Trafford. Quite quickly, Freedman built a range of more than 1,000 United products — everything from bedspreads to credit cards. But he only understood quite how mighty United’s brand was when sportswear companies bid fortunes to provide the club’s kit. These companies were themselves mighty global brands. Consumers paid a premium for shoes that carried Nike’s Swoosh logo or Adidas’ three stripes. These companies had revenues many times higher than United’s. And yet, Freedman figured, United’s brand must be even stronger than theirs. If the Nike or Adidas brands were the stronger, he reasoned, then United would be paying them for the right to put the Swoosh or stripes on the club shirts. “Probably United were the pioneers of modern soccer marketing,” Joan Oliver, Barcelona’s chief executive until last year, told me. Today, clubs like United and Barcelona sell their stuff — monetize their brand, in effect — in thousands of shops and online stores worldwide.



Growing the brand

All big clubs now understand the power of their brand. They need to, because for the first time they are reaching beyond their traditional home markets to sell their brands to the world. Only the very strongest soccer brands will succeed in tapping the markets of China, North America, Japan, and later, India. Each of these clubs will need to understand exactly just what its brand is and will need to manage this brand more sensitively than soccer clubs ever have before.

Back when Freedman began work at Old Trafford, a soccer brand was not the same thing it is today. American, Canadian or Chinese fans were virtually nonexistent. Soccer fans still mostly supported their local club, knew the club’s history, and had strong brand loyalty. A Manchester United fan wouldn’t become a Liverpool fan.

That changed during the 1990s. First satellite TV and later, internet, carried the big European club brands to the corners of the earth. Imagine a family room in Shanghai, but it could just as well be in Soweto or Sapporo, Japan. A dozen people are sitting around a TV watching United play Wolves. None of them knows that Manchester is a city in England, a country they will never visit. All of them support Manchester United, though they probably support other clubs as well. The United brand means something different to these new fans than it did to local Mancunian fans in the 1980s.

How are clubs expanding their influence abroad? That's next...