Global appeal lures new sponsor to Aston Villa
THE new shirt sponsor of Aston Villa believes the club offers a great opportunity for the company to grow on the back of the global appeal of the Premier League.
At the official unveiling in Birmingham of FxPro as the new name on the Villains’ shirts, its strategic relations director Jim Manczak told TheBusinessDesk.com he hoped this was just the beginning of a long and fruitful relationship with the club and English football.
“As for our strategy to grow our brand globally, we looked at sports sponsorship with great viewership and great coverage,” he said.
“We found the Premier League was at the top and after identifying the league, we started looking at the availability of teams and we came here. The whole process took about two months.”
Founded in 2006, FxPro is a relatively young company which employs around 150 people worldwide and is headquartered in Cyprus.
It is a global foreign exchange broker and has just one office in the UK, in London, where it has also struck a three-year deal with another Premier League team, Fulham, giving the company a foothold and audience in the UK’s two largest cities.
Executive director Denis Sukhotin said: “We’re mostly working outside the UK, only 3% of our operations are here, so of course, over a period of time, we would look to have more UK connections and this is one of the reasons we’re here.”
Mr Manczak added: “One of the key decisions was because Aston Villa is the main team in this region. It gives us a great presence in the Midlands and the UK.
“It is a new relationship – we’ll have to look at how it grows and benefits both parties but initial feedback and initial interest in our brand has been tremendous. We look forward to being in the Premier League for quite some years to come.”
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The exact details of the sponsorship contract between Aston Villa and FxPro remain a closely guarded secret, other than it is for three years and includes a relationship between the company and Midlands children’s hospice Acorns.
The club famously forewent shirt sponsorship for two seasons and instead chose to put the Acorns name on its shirts, giving the hospice unparalleled levels of much welcome free publicity.
Mr Manczak stopped short of giving actual figures, but he said that the company had given a cash donation to the hospice and would continue to support it, both in monetary terms and publicity via the FxPro website where visitors could donate to the hospice.
As part of the launch event, the new kit was shown off at the ICC by unveiling a giant 2010/11 shirt down the side of the venue while players put their best foot forward in a catwalk show wearing the new strip (right).
