Bundesliga Pips Premier League In Shirt Deals
Buoyed by Bayern Munich’s £17m a year deal with T-Mobile, Germany’s Bundesliga has overtaken the English Premier League in terms of the total annual value of the league’s shirt sponsorship deals, according to the latest yearly Jersey Report from research firm Sport+Markt.
The surprising move comes in a 12 month period that saw total revenue from shirt sponsorship deals across the major European leagues drop significantly for the first time in 10 years to €393.2m.
After being the leading league last season, the FA Premier League now occupies second position with €85.5m, having slipped behind the Bundesliga’s total value of €102.9m.
Despite a decrease in overall income, the Premier League still accounts for two of the top 5 deals through Manchester United’s tie-up with AIG (2nd) and Chelsea’s sponsorship contract with Samsung (4th).
The primary reasons attributed to the drop-off in the Premier League’s shirt sponsorship revenue were the weak currency of the British pound against the Euro and the fact that a number of English top-flight clubs are currently without a shirt sponsor of any value.
West Ham’s deal with XL Leisure recently ended followed the travel company’s bankruptcy while West Bromwich Albion have failed to attract a sponsor at all. In addition, Aston Villa have a sponsorship contract with charity group Acorns which has no monetary value.
The situation is likely to reverse in the future as Gareth Moore, international sales director, Sport+Markt, predicts: ‘If the currency or the teams that are lacking a paying sponsor recover, the Premier League will top the ranking of the Jersey Report again next season.’
Despite the financial crisis, the finance and insurance sector still contributes the lion’s share to European income from shirt sponsorship investing the highest sum of all sectors with €80.7m.
In comparison to last season’s European Jersey Report, this only represents a minus of about €3m. Altogether, 34 financial or insurance companies are on the shirts of Europe’s six top leagues – four less than last season.
