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Nike is ubiquitous in the sports world. Not only is it the single most valuable sports brand, commanding more than 60% of the US footwear market, but it also puts its money behind some of the world’s biggest names in sports. On the athlete side Nike counts the likes of Derek Jeter, LeBron James and Cristiano Ronaldo among its endorsers. And its widespread team merchandise deals have led to partnerships with some of soccer’s most valuable teams, the NCAA Tournament’s most successful squads and, most recently, America’s most popular sports league.
So a sports fan might expect that Nike would be similarly involved at the ongoing 2015 Cricket World Cup, one of the global sport’s premier events. And yet, despite its involvement in seemingly every corner of the sports world, the top brand’s iconic swoosh adorns the jersey of just a single team: India.
Nike joined up with India back in 2005 on what was reported to be a five-year deal worth just under $45 million, or roughly $9 million per year. That original agreement was later extended to include the 2011 World Cup, a savvy move considering that India went on to win the tournament on home soil that year. Shortly afterwards Nike held off a competing Adidas bid and re-upped with India for five additional years at more than $12 million per.
As far as picking teams go, Nike couldn’t have done a much better job. Not only did the men in blue celebrate a 2011 World Cup victory, but they also took home the 2013 ICC Champions Trophy in England two years later. More important than on-pitch victories, however, is that no nation is more cricket-crazy than India, making the national team a veritable goldmine of exposure for any associated brand.
India isn’t favored to win this year’s tournament, but Nike’s team has thrived in its only match of the tournament thus far, a victory over arch-rival Pakistan at a nearly sold-out Adelaide Oval. Superstar Virat Kohli had a century, and some stellar bowling left Pakistan all out for 224 to India’s 300. An upcoming match against Adidas-sponsored South Africa on Sunday is a much bigger challenge, and a victory there would give Nike another stage to shine on as India continues its attempted title defense.
As for this year, mutli-team sponsorship is particularly rare. The tournament’s 14 teams are sponsored by at least ten different kit partners. Nike rival Adidas has two with England and South Africa, and only one other company, New Zealand sportswear maker Canterbury, has deals with multiple teams. Canterbury is behind hometown team and tournament co-host New Zealand and, apparently, Scotland. The Scots wore Canterbury’s logo in their opening match, but no additional information on that deal was readily available.
Some other teams didn’t find kit sponsors until right before the tournament. The United Arab Emirates wound up partnering with Indian apparel company TYKA in January, while it wasn’t until two days before the World Cup’s first match that the West Indies Cricket Board announced its kit deal with Spanish sports brand Joma.
Below is a breakdown of each team’s kit and jersey sponsors. Kit partners are the sportswear companies that manufacture the actual jerseys, while jersey sponsors simply pay for ad space on them.
As noted above, it’s so far unclear what companies, if any, have kit deals with either Bangladesh or Zimbabwe. The former’s match-day jerseys sport only a Sahara sponsorship logo, which is reportedly worth more than $2 million per year. The nation’s cricket board lists three other sponsors on its website, none of them apparel companies. As for Zimbabwe, the only jersey sponsor logo is for Indian textile company Donear. No information on that partnership could be found; in the table above we’ve guessed that it’s a jersey deal.
Sahara was previously the Indian team’s jersey sponsor for over a decade, but that came to an end in late 2013. Indian television network Star India wound up winning those rights on a three-year-plus deal that pays some $100,000 per match at an ICC-sponsored tournament like the World Cup.
It might be odd to see Nike so limited in an event as big as the World Cup, but the opportunity to expand might be just around the corner. Tournament favorite Australia’s 2011 partnership with Asics will be up soon, and England may also wind up on the block as kit sponsor Adidas is reportedly reassessing its sports deals in the wake of a massive $1.3 billion Manchester United kit deal.
Source: India Is Nike's Only Hope At The 2015 Cricket World Cup - Forbes
So a sports fan might expect that Nike would be similarly involved at the ongoing 2015 Cricket World Cup, one of the global sport’s premier events. And yet, despite its involvement in seemingly every corner of the sports world, the top brand’s iconic swoosh adorns the jersey of just a single team: India.
Nike joined up with India back in 2005 on what was reported to be a five-year deal worth just under $45 million, or roughly $9 million per year. That original agreement was later extended to include the 2011 World Cup, a savvy move considering that India went on to win the tournament on home soil that year. Shortly afterwards Nike held off a competing Adidas bid and re-upped with India for five additional years at more than $12 million per.
As far as picking teams go, Nike couldn’t have done a much better job. Not only did the men in blue celebrate a 2011 World Cup victory, but they also took home the 2013 ICC Champions Trophy in England two years later. More important than on-pitch victories, however, is that no nation is more cricket-crazy than India, making the national team a veritable goldmine of exposure for any associated brand.
India isn’t favored to win this year’s tournament, but Nike’s team has thrived in its only match of the tournament thus far, a victory over arch-rival Pakistan at a nearly sold-out Adelaide Oval. Superstar Virat Kohli had a century, and some stellar bowling left Pakistan all out for 224 to India’s 300. An upcoming match against Adidas-sponsored South Africa on Sunday is a much bigger challenge, and a victory there would give Nike another stage to shine on as India continues its attempted title defense.
As for this year, mutli-team sponsorship is particularly rare. The tournament’s 14 teams are sponsored by at least ten different kit partners. Nike rival Adidas has two with England and South Africa, and only one other company, New Zealand sportswear maker Canterbury, has deals with multiple teams. Canterbury is behind hometown team and tournament co-host New Zealand and, apparently, Scotland. The Scots wore Canterbury’s logo in their opening match, but no additional information on that deal was readily available.
Some other teams didn’t find kit sponsors until right before the tournament. The United Arab Emirates wound up partnering with Indian apparel company TYKA in January, while it wasn’t until two days before the World Cup’s first match that the West Indies Cricket Board announced its kit deal with Spanish sports brand Joma.
Below is a breakdown of each team’s kit and jersey sponsors. Kit partners are the sportswear companies that manufacture the actual jerseys, while jersey sponsors simply pay for ad space on them.
As noted above, it’s so far unclear what companies, if any, have kit deals with either Bangladesh or Zimbabwe. The former’s match-day jerseys sport only a Sahara sponsorship logo, which is reportedly worth more than $2 million per year. The nation’s cricket board lists three other sponsors on its website, none of them apparel companies. As for Zimbabwe, the only jersey sponsor logo is for Indian textile company Donear. No information on that partnership could be found; in the table above we’ve guessed that it’s a jersey deal.
Sahara was previously the Indian team’s jersey sponsor for over a decade, but that came to an end in late 2013. Indian television network Star India wound up winning those rights on a three-year-plus deal that pays some $100,000 per match at an ICC-sponsored tournament like the World Cup.
It might be odd to see Nike so limited in an event as big as the World Cup, but the opportunity to expand might be just around the corner. Tournament favorite Australia’s 2011 partnership with Asics will be up soon, and England may also wind up on the block as kit sponsor Adidas is reportedly reassessing its sports deals in the wake of a massive $1.3 billion Manchester United kit deal.
Source: India Is Nike's Only Hope At The 2015 Cricket World Cup - Forbes
