Manchester City sign record deal with Puma
Manchester City has signed the biggest commercial deal in the club’s history, a shirt sponsorship deal with German kit manufacturer Puma worth £650m over 10 years. It’s a marked increase for the Cityzens, from current six year deal with Nike worth roughly £20m a year.
Puma is spending big as it seeks to break the dominance of Nike and Adidas in the global sportswear market. Football club deals are particularly valuable because sportswear brands typically keep the lion’s share of retail sales.
In the Premier League City Football Group’s deal is behind only Manchester United’s £75m a year with Adidas, while broadly matching Chelsea’s £60m a year deal with Nike.
City’s Chief Executive Ferran Soriano was delighted with the new deal that eclipsed any partnership the Manchester based club has ever got involved in.
“It’s a historic day for us, what we are doing has never been done before. It is an unprecedented partnership.”
“We needed a partner that can grow fast with us. This is who we are now, this is the product we can offer. Having just one partner saves time in discussions and it allows us to do things globally.”
“There are so many synergies and things that we can do together if we have the same partner. If we have one idea, then we only have to talk to one person,” said City chief executive.
The contract covers all the clubs in City Football Group except New York City as Major League Soccer has a deal with Adidas covering all the top tier clubs in the United States.
The club is set to launch its new kit come July when they face sister club Yokohama Marinos in their pre-season tour of Asia.
