Kit manufacturers

[Don't Skip Leg Day]

Question, does anyone know why we’ve ended up with about 3-4 kit manufacturers in the premiership and none of those are the brands like Gilbert, Canterbury, adidas, Nike etc

Macron and Castore seem to have cornered the market but just wondering why those other ‘traditional’ rugby brands aren't involved.

 

[Kiwiwomble]

id be interested to know this, we have a collective kit deals in NZ (for super rugby) which is a bit boring, juts the same template in different colours. I was always surprised that was a better deal than having other manufacturers competing

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Probably just comes down to money,
Rugby is niche and will bring very little in, I can't remember the last time I saw someone wearing rugby merch other than England, day to day (at the shops or whatever)
To someone like Castore or Macron getting rugby deals brings more eyes to their brand (I wouldn't have heard of them if they didn't, for example) so they'd be happier to put in a bigger bid, a Nike or an Adidas doesn't care about eyeballs just sales and rugby isn't gonna bring in the bucks

I wonder if some of the more traditional ones (Gilbert, Cotton traders etc.) just can't afford to keep up with the latest technologies etc so don't bother trying to get the high level deals - kit for your local 4ths team is easier to knock out than whatever spray on Lycra the pros are wearing these days, plus all the other stash that'd be required as part of a deal with a club (off field, training, travel, media, warm up, bags etc)

 

[pagliaccio_euforico]

Team sports kit and equipment make such a small percentage of Nike and adidas revenue. It's only worth it for them to sponsor something if it can help them sell t shirts. All blacks and South Africa are probably the only nations that have the brand to sell merchandise.

I believe that a lot of the big brands were subcontracting the kit to other companis and slapping a logo on it. Macron and castore are more kit companies than shirt and shoe brands.

For the classic companies, they got beat out by the giants and now the giants are leaving new companies are entering.

 

[Saintjay]

You would have thought England sell enough to attract a major brand.

Yet even Umbro were at best a mid-tier supplier so maybe the England money and demand is not there either.

 

[pagliaccio_euforico]

England has a contract with Charles tyrwhitt cause they move $100 dress shirts not $50 t shirts.

 

[Don't Skip Leg Day]

Companies like Gilbert do still make top end kit for the South African teams and the dragons (for example), so guessing they’ve been out bid by the bigger companies

 

[davten]

Have no complaints with the quality or range of merchandise VX3 have supplied us for the last couple of seasons, Id say it was an improvement on Macron. Hopefully our merch will still be supplied by VX3 now the take over has happened.