football tees and designer soccer shirts - cescy

Ruth Mortimer, from Marketing Week, wrote this article about why Kaka is worth so much money to Real Madrid. She explained the high sums of money that are being spent by Real Madrid, like the 56 million price tag for Kaka.

But why are these deals, which seem extraordinarily enormous in cash terms, still so popular with clubs? Well, according to Professor Simon Chadwick, who was commissioned by Weber Shandwick Sport to run the figures, the Kaka deal could be worth as much as $100m per year to Real Madrid.

This is because the signing is likely to boost shirt sales, sponsorship revenue, match ticket sales and the team’s global fan base. If Manchester United’s current golden boy Cristiano Ronaldo was to join Kaka at Real Madrid, this could be worth up to an additional $75m a year, should Manchester United sell the current FIFA World Player of the Year – meaning a double-signing could be worth $175m each year for the Spanish club.

It’s interesting that one player can add 100 million in revenue in one year, mostly through football shirt sales. But she went on to put this in parallel to the David Beckham experience at Real Madrid.

When David Beckham moved to Real Madrid, his tenure at the Santiago Bernabeu earnt the club $600 million in sales of shirts and other merchandise alone (with a million shirts sold in just six months), increasing merchandising profits by 137% over four seasons between 2003/4 and 2006/7.

Not only is that insane, but quite scary. It seems Perez is not trying so much to make the best team in the world, but rather make the most profitable team in the world. Crisis? What crisis?