Manchester Utd to open retail outlets

Manchester United Football Club has struck a deal with sports retailer Allsports to take the club’s brand into high street stores.

The Premier League club has one dedicated franchised store at Dublin Airport and a club shop at its Old Trafford home ground. It will open “shop-in-shop” concessions in three Allsports’ stores from August and plans two more standalone Manchester United shops.

The shops will sell a full range of the club’s 1,000 product lines, from branded coffee mugs to bottles of claret.

The driving force behind the Allsports deal is Man Utd merchandising director Steve Richards, who was previously managing director of Allsports. He says the deal, which was finalised before Easter, is part of a “learning process” to discover the power of the Man Utd brand.

Recommended

ONdigital replies to Ivan Clark’s questions

Marketing Week

I read Ivan Clark’s media comment on ONdigital with some incredulity (MW April 15). Incredulity that he should want to raise in print questions he could get the answers to with one phone call. Anyway, here are the answers. He asks why only 30,000 customers are signing up each month. Well, he is almost alone […]

CK poaches Bridge from Optimedia

Marketing Week

Unilever-owned Calvin Klein Cosmetics has poached Optimedia director Gary Bridge to manage its European advertising operations. Bridge takes up the new position of European media director at Calvin Klein Cosmetics after four years as Optimedia’s group media director, working on the British Airways global account. He will be responsible for advertising and will be the […]

ONdigital hires marketing boss

Marketing Week

ONdigital has appointed former Planet Hollywood marketer Guy Laurence as its first sales and marketing director. Laurence will handle all aspects of brand development for the digital TV company, which has a 40m advertising budget. He will join ONdigital’s seven-strong senior management team and report to chief executive Stephen Grabiner. Director of brand marketing Marc […]