Football shirts - the bigger picture

Football shirts - the bigger picture

2022 saw over 12 million units of Premier League football shirts sold across the calendar year, raising £488,920,000 for the 20 clubs combined (The Sports Journal, 2023). In addition, the Premier League clubs banked a record £471m in sponsorship deals by August 2023 – (Mail Online, 2023). This includes front-of shirt sponsorship worth £378 million, with a further £93 million generated from sleeve deals.

Figure 1: A graph to show Premier League shirt sales in 2022 using statistics from 'The Sports Journal'

Shirts have become a huge part of a club’s revenue, no matter how big the club; while some clubs use shirt sales and sponsorship as extra revenue to spend on recruiting players, others rely on it for survival. I will be looking into why this is so important for clubs and sponsors alike.

Up until the late 1990s, match-worn shirts from top-tier teams would still be washed and reused for other games. Nowadays, Premier League players will wear multiple shirts per game. So what happens to these shirts after they’ve been taken off and chucked onto the dressing room floor? We know that big clubs get many requests from charities for shirts to be donated for fundraising. But I want to know what happens to the shirts of clubs playing grassroots football, and where in the world they find themselves once the season has ended.

The shirt manufacturer Puma has made it their goal to make 90% of their football shirts out of sustainable recycled plastics by 2025 (Fashion Network, 2021). I want to understand why this is such a big deal within the mass-producing football shirts industry. Football shirts are predominantly made from a mix of polyester and elastane (more commonly known as Lycra). These materials can take up to 200 years to decompose, and are difficult to dye, requiring particularly potent chemicals to make sure shirts are the correct colour (Jackalo, 2023). Once these dyes enter water systems, they can be toxic to fragile aquatic ecosystems.

So, within the documentary, I will also discuss why it’s so important for shirts to be recycled, not just for the benefit of people but for the planet as well.

References

Fashion Network/Guinebault, M., 2021. Puma plans to use 90% sustainable materials by 2025. Available from: https://ww.fashionnetwork.com/news/Puma-plans-to-use-90-sustainable-materials-by-2025,1303912.html [Accessed 25th November] 

Jackalo, 2023. How long will this fabric take to decompose?. Available from: https://hellojackalo.com/blogs/news/fabric-decompose [Accessed 25th November] 

Mail Online/ Harris, N., Miller, A., 2023. In the money: Premier League clubs bank record £471m in shirt sponsor deals after Chelsea £40m-a-year tie-up…as Todd Boehly’s mega offer secures crucial land and Liverpool sell the most shirts globally. Available from: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-12401871/IN-MONEY-Premier-League-clubs-bank-record-471m-shirt-sponsor-deals-Chelseas-40m-year-tie-Todd-Boehlys-mega-offer-secures-crucial-land-Liverpool-sell-shirts-globally.html [Accessed 24th November]

The Sports Journal/Al Raisi, O., 2023. Premier League clubs retail, merchandise, apparel & product licensing revenue data. Available from: https://sportsjournal.io/premier-league-merchandise-revenue-data/ [Accessed 25th November]