The piramid of Nike sponsorship

From the Champions League to Italian Serie C. This is the photograph of the pyramid of sponsorships used by Nike, in which some clubs enjoy a personalized contract and very important figures, while others - of much lower categories - are dressed by Swoosh with standard templates and not customizable. A layered system in which clubs of all professional and geographical affiliations meet, and as Footyheadlines.com explains, the clear separation into five contractual hemispheres starts from the richest relationships (at the top) and goes down to those companies that, instead, they have a contractual relationship with Nike less and less strong. A clarification: National teams have not been included in this ranking.

It starts with Elite, the most lucrative type of contract for a football club, and includes Barcelona, Liverpool, PSG, Chelsea, Leipzig, Inter, Roma, Atletico Madrid and Galatasaray. What distinguishes this type of relationship is first and foremost an economic factor. The contracts that tie these top clubs to Nike travel on very high figures: Liverpool in the first year of Nike will receive 39,5 million euros, Chelsea - who wears the Swoosh just a season - takes from Beaveton 69,5 million euros, PSG 75, Barcelona even 105; For the Italians, the figures are lower as Inter receive only 10 million and the Roma 17 (the Giallorossi, moreover, will leave the brand at the end of the next season).In addition to the financial compensation, the relationship between Nike and these clubs is reflected especially in the design, so each club has three custom kits (Home, Away and Third) and can benefit from customized advertising campaigns, that allow the club to have a much greater visibility and to better sponsor their kits. An example is that of Leipzig, entered this year in the elite of Nike and became a new subject of high-level sports fashion.

Immediately below instead there are the 'Premium' contracts, which receive customized material (first and second kit), more training material and garments always customized. This includes Eintracht Frankfurt, Zenit, Hertha Berlin, Sanfrecce Hiroshima, Steaua Bucharest, Corinthians, Spartak Moscow, Sparta Prague, Ferencvaros and Club America. Among these, surprisingly, there is also Venice, Italian club Serie B this year in the third season with Nike. The charm of the Venetian city has certainly influenced this investment of the American brand.

In third place there are the clubs with a Standard type relationship, that is that they have a direct contact with Nike and that also receive a financial contribution - Seville, for example, receives 2.3 million per season -, but they do not have a custom design for kits (they all have a standard pattern, customized only with the colors of their club). This category includes dozens of clubs including Seville, Young Boys, Brighton, Maccabi Haifa, Vitesse and Utrecht.

The fourth level of the pyramid is the 'Third Party', and since then there is no direct contact between the clubs and Nike. The companies receive technical material of the American brand through intermediaries that operate nationally - Nike German, Nike England, etc. In this range the clubs are hundreds and scattered here in every category (FC Augsburg, Hansa Rostock, Bochum, Munich 1860, Birmingham, Portsmouth, Livingston, FC Eindhoven). On the last step of the pyramid - and with the highest number of clubs - there are the 'No Contracts', and there are all the teams that dress Nike but do not have a relationship with the Swoosh: simply, the clubs pay to have the supply of technical material. The kits are standard and customized by the clubs with their own social colors, and among the others there are the Italians Arezzo and Ascoli.