The English Premier League is without a doubt one of the biggest sports competitions in the world. It also contains a couple of the richest sports teams. Due to income from broadcasting rights, match day revenue and of course sponsorships these clubs can buy almost any player.

The 2017/18 Premier League season sees the introduction of sleeve sponsorships. In addition to the regular shirt sponsors, clubs are allowed a second brand on the jerseys’ sleeve. Below we take a look at these sleeve sponsorships, but also give an overview of the kit and shirt sponsors of the 2017/18 Premier League clubs.

Kit sponsors: 20 clubs, 8 brands

Break down of 2017/18 Premier League kits per brand, with Puma supplying a fourth of the market.

The 20 Premier League teams are sponsored by eight different clothing brands. We will see Adidas, Joma, Puma, Macron, New Balance, Nike, Umbro and Under Armour on the Premier League pitches this year. In 2016/17 there were ten different brands supplying the Premier League kits.

Puma is the main kit supplier with five teams. Arsenal, Burnley, Leicester City and promoted sides Huddersfield Town and Newcastle United are all sponsored by the German brand.

Puma takes over from Adidas, who held that title last season, and now sponsors just three teams. With the relegation of Sunderland and Middlesbrough and Chelsea’s switch to Nike, the three-striped brand lost three teams. They only added Watford to their Premier League portfolio that already contained West Bromwich Albion and a record deal with Manchester United.

Nike supplies four Premier League teams this year, while that was only one last year. The American brand already sponsored Manchester City, just like Brighton & Hove Albion who won promotion to the highest level last season. The brand will now also sponsor 2016/17 Premier League champion Chelsea and runner-up Tottenham Hotspur. This will ensure they supply last season’s top three, who will all play Champions League. A great move by Nike to gain more visibility.

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English manufacturer Umbro has three teams in their portfolio: Bournemouth, Everton and West Ham United. Macron, New Balance, Joma and Under Armour sponsor the other teams.

Four teams have switched brands for the upcoming season, including Bournemouth from JD to Umbro, Watford from Dryworld to Adidas and Chelsea and Tottenham from Adidas and Under Armour respectively to Nike.

Chelsea’s Nike deal is said to be a 15-year contract worth around 60 million pounds per year. While Tottenham’s multi-year deal is said to be worth around 30 million pounds per year.

Shirt Sponsors 2017/18 Premier League

Gambling companies have a big presence in football. Before the 2017/18 season, the FA (the English football association) announced they would end all sponsorships with gambling companies following a three-month internal review. Clubs, however, are still very much involved with the gambling industry and will likely remain so. Nine out of the 20 clubs playing in this season’s Premier League have a gambling company as shirt sponsor. As they are not always exclusive agreements, these clubs may as well have more partnerships with gambling companies.
The other eleven clubs are also all involved with (multiple) gambling companies, either as regular partner or as sleeve sponsor.

Besides the gambling partners, four shirt sponsors could be categorised as being active in the financial services sector. While the rest of the shirt sponsors are active in the airline, automotive, duty-free shop, telecommunications or landscape design sector.

The companies come from across the world, with a majority having their headquarters in Asia, Europe or the US.

Introduction of sleeve sponsors in the Premier League

With the introduction of sleeve sponsorships, Premier League clubs will have an additional source of income from the 2017/18 season onwards. On average the sleeve sponsors are expected to be worth around twenty percent of what the shirt sponsorships generate.

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There have been talks about a collective agreement of eight to ten clubs with one company, but so far no official announcements have been made.

Arsenal will not have a sleeve sponsor as their contract with their main shirt sponsor Emirates prohibits them from having any other brands on their kits.

So far seventeen Premier League teams have confirmed a sleeve sponsor for the 2017/18 season. This includes Manchester City, who was the first to announce Nexen Tire as sleeve sponsor in March, and Southampton who has Virgin Media as shirt (front) and sleeve sponsor.

The sleeve sponsorships will give a new look to the Premier League kits. Whether it means there is too much branding, we will see when the Premier League starts on August 12.