Sponsors pay the most to a club in crisis

Manchester United is the world leader in marketing revenues, earning 269 million euros annually – eight million more than FC Barcelona.

It has been five years since they last won the English league title, and just as long since they reached the last eight of the Champions League. At present, Manchester United is going through a sporting crisis: they have had their worst start to a season in 29 years, and there is growing talk about the dismissal of coach José Mourinho. Despite this, the “Red Devils” are number one in sports business. According to a study by the Spanish company CSM Sport & Entertainment, Manchester United has the most lucrative sponsorship income, worth 269 million euros a year. That is eight million more than second-placed FC Barcelona. “Our research analyses the five most watched competitions in Europe and reveals a total of 2,284 sponsorship deals involving 1,606 companies,” said Inigo Escrivá de Romani Cano, chief executive of CSM Sport & Entertainment, to the Economic Daily.

When winning is not enough
The results from the Madrid-based analytical company confirm that a club does not have to be successful on the pitch to be attractive to sponsors or fans. “They have a perfectly set-up global business model, which is not harmed even by setbacks in sports performance. United is a brand whose strength is confirmed precisely in such analyses,” said Jozef Tokos, sports analyst and football agent. In addition to the sponsorship ranking, this is also shown by the comparison of total revenues of top clubs compiled by Deloitte. Data from last year show that Manchester United earned the most overall – more than 676 million euros – from the sum of commercial revenues, sales of television rights, and ticket sales. “On the other hand, Real Madrid’s sponsorship income is interesting. Even though they won the Champions League three times in a row, in this area they lag behind Manchester and Barcelona by almost 100 million euros,” Tokos noted. The lucrativeness of such contracts is directly related to television viewership, where English football has long recorded the highest numbers. “In a comparison of countries and sponsorship income, the Premier League is number one. More than 400 contracts bring clubs in the top division over 1.2 billion euros,” said Romani Cano. By comparison, clubs in Germany’s second Bundesliga improve their budgets this way by almost half a billion less – specifically 734.7 million euros.

Generous financial sector
In addition to the size of the sponsorship contracts, CSM Sport & Entertainment also focused on the individual economic sectors from which the deals come. These show that the most generous sponsors are companies from the financial sector, which annually provide clubs in the top five competitions with 314 million euros. “There are no surprises in this ranking. After finance comes automotive, airlines, and betting companies. And in terms of marketing investment size, there are not big differences between them,” said Tokos. Particularly interesting are the sponsorship deals from airlines. Teams from elite countries have signed 22 contracts with them, worth a total of 266 million euros. On average, this means about 12 million per contract, by far the most compared to other sectors. For example, the mentioned financial sector has signed as many as 129 sponsorship deals (an average of 2.4 million per deal). And how is it in Slovakia? “Here, club support is in most cases linked to its owner: Grafobal with Slovan, Tento with Žilina, or ŽOS Trnava with Spartak,” Tokos explained. Companies tend to associate their brand more with the national team, examples being Slovenská sporiteľňa, Fortuna, or AAA Auto.

The clubs with highest income from sponsors 
(in million euro)

1. Man. United 269

2. FC Barcelona 261

3. Bayern Munich 180

4. Real Madrid 178

5. FC Chelsea 154

6. Man. City 149

7. Arsenal 124

8. FC Liverpool 117

9. Paris SG 112

10. Juventus Torino 101

Source: CSM Sport & Entertainment