Starting this season, Premier League teams will have the potential to obtain an extra revenue stream where they can now sell ad space on their sleeves. In previous years, sleeves had the Premier League crest patched on their kits, now teams can sell the space.
These sponsorships aren’t going to be as lucrative as the kit sponsors on a player’s chest, a deal for a sleeve sponsor is about 20% of the kit sponsor so it’s still a lot of money. Case in point, Manchester United has been in talks to sign Tinder, yes the “dating” site where you swipe left and right on profiles, to a sleeve sponsorship deal.
At a £12 million ($15.8 million) per year, it’s slightly more than 20% of their £50 million ($66 million) per year kit sponsor deal with Chevrolet but remains within that range of how much a sleeve sponsor is worth. And speaking of Chevrolet, I have to imagine they are okay partnering with Tinder to be on the same shirt. That could be an issue for certain sponsors. For example, Chevrolet probably wouldn’t want Manchester United signing with a beer company to be its sleeve sponsor because the two would be associated together due to being on the same kit that it could send the wrong message.
Out of nine Premier League teams already with announced sleeve sponsorship deals, Manchester City is making the most with their sleeve sponsorship with a £10 million ($13.2 million) deal with Nexen Tire. With less than two weeks left in the Premier League season, Chelsea and Manchester City are the only “big six” teams who have sleeve sponsors.
The only downside to a potential Tinder sponsorship deal with Manchester United is that the sponsor can only feature on the left sleeve because the Premier League crest will remain on the right sleeve. So if this deal goes through, get ready for lots of jokes about “swiping left.”
