Castleford Tigers have to reveal a new retail brand for the club moving forwards that underpins everything Castleford Tigers stands for.
Club Castleford, as the brand will be known, takes the place of the traditional kit manufacturer on the club’s 2020 playing and replica shirts, plus associated off-field and training wear.
Based around #PridePassionHeritage, it has seen the club introduce a third shirt for next season inspired by our rich history as well as retaining the modern aspects of the club’s brand.
The Tigers will continue to work closely with Yorkshire-based Elite Pro Sports in 2020 as they remain a key part of the Club Castleford project, with some of the main elements of the new brand including:
- Greater control of all aspects of the club’s retail operation moving forwards.
- A “best of both worlds” deal with the club’s own retail brand supported by partners Elite Pro Sports, which has over 30 years’ experience in production, retail and e-commerce.
- Future opportunities for local community clubs to license the Club Castleford brand for their own merchandise needs, with further details on this at a later date.
- Driven by fan feedback with plans for this to continue further with a new supporter steering group in 2020.
Castleford Tigers’ Managing Director Mark Grattan explains: “The launch of the Club Castleford brand is a really exciting one for our retail operation.
“The UK marketplace is rapidly changing in terms of kit manufacturers and we thought the best option was to set up our own retail brand that puts us 100 per cent in control of our look and image, whilst retaining our current strong partnership with Elite Pro Sports behind the scenes.
“This will ensure all of our products will be designed in Yorkshire and produced in the same factories as before, and we’ve done our utmost to listen to feedback with a view to delivering even more quality retail products for the large and diverse fanbase that we have.
“We’re fully confident that we’ve achieved this for 2020, and we’re also excited to expand on this fan involvement for next season in several ways.
“We’ve manufactured the away shirt for next season in a different material to the home and third shirts to gauge reaction from supporters around their preferences and we’ve also introduced some new maroon training ranges for 2020 based on the Queensland Origin colours.
“Again, this has been done to provide greater choice to supporters and we’ll review the response to this before deciding on future colour palettes for training and off-field ranges in 2021.
“Lastly, we’re excited to announce plans to bring together a new supporter steering group that will meet bi-monthly to discuss different aspects of the club. We’re looking to launch this shortly with a view to starting in the New Year and a part of this will be to get fans involved in some of the decisions we make around future merchandise with the chance to input their own ideas on retail and other matters.”
Lee Jenkinson, CEO of Elite Pro Sports, said: “We absolutely love working with Castleford Tigers and we’ll continue to have a really close relationship with the club moving into 2020.
“When the Tigers came to us and said they wanted to work through the possibility of creating their own brand for next season, we were 100 per cent excited by it and keen to lend our support along the journey.
“A significant part of our partnership will remain unchanged for next season, but the launch of a new brand opens up some different possibilities for the club and we’ll be working together to maximise those opportunities.”
Source & Image: www.castlefordtigers.com
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