A Red Warrior

The new kid is on the ridiculous money, footballing block.

A company synonymous with Lacrosse equipment in America, and not a whole lot else... Warrior Sports will design and manufacture Liverpool's kits from the summer of 2012, at a rumoured cost of £25m a season.

It is important to put this into consideration.  Current manufacturers of the fourth biggest selling replica shirt in world football, adidas have decided not to match the offer from Warrior.  The German company's current deal is worth £12m a season - which for a shirt that is only outsold by the Spanish giants of Barcelona and Real Madrid, and the commercial Juggernaut that is Manchester United, is a quite frankly poultry figure.

Warrior's deal with Liverpool values the strength of the brand at a far more realistic level.  It beats Nike's £23.3m deal with United, setting the record for a kit deal in the UK.  Of course, the Warrior deal will almost certainly be topped by the time United come to negotiate their new deal in 2015 as the money in English football continues to grow, yet the message the deal sends out for both Liverpool and Warrior is could prove to be worth more than the £25m.

For the first time, Liverpool are beginning to fulfill their commercial potential.  Not only this deal, but last years £20m per season deal with Standard Chartered can be highlighted as comprehensive proof of this.  Arguably the one and only positive that the crippling reign of Hicks and Gillett brought to the club was the appointment of Ian Ayre as Commercial Director.  His promotion to the position of Managing Director earlier this year was fully deserved; based on his achievements in bringing the club to a level which makes the most of its history and status within the game. 

With the impending Financial Fair Play rules on the horizon, the money that a club can bring in from sponsorship and manufacturing deals have taken on new importance.  Gone will be the days of Manchester City spending staggering amounts of money on transfers, if it outweighs the money being brought into the club.  Liverpool's owners, FSG are very aware of this.  Their links to the Boston based parent company of Warrior, New Balance will have undoubtedly have played a role in the deal.  Yet, it is difficult for any fan of the club, or onlooker from afar to be anything less than impressed with the start they have made as owners of England's most decorated club.

The deal marks Warrior's first venture in to football, and with the amount of money involved one thing can be guaranteed - this will not be a half interested attempt.  In March, the considerably more well known Under Armour agreed a five year deal with Tottenham (£10m a season, for what its worth), representing a similar entry in to the sport.  Not only does that highlight the coup pulled off by Liverpool, but also shows the determination of Warrior to be associated with a team of Liverpool's standing in football.

There was a rumble of discontent amongst some fans when the news was broken a few weeks back, by those who's attachment to adidas seemed stronger to that of Liverpool.  What about the stripes? What about if we have rubbish kits? Who's going to wear Warrior? Fact is, if it's red and has a Liverpool badge on it - it will sell like an adidas shirt would, or a Nike shirt would.  I simply refuse to believe there are fans out there who but football shirts dependent on the manufacturing brand.  Not a chance.

Every brand had to start somewhere - including Nike and adidas, and who's to say Warrior won't be spoken of in the same breath as they in thirty years?

Liverpool are pioneering again, 32 years after the first sponsored shirt in the Football League, they welcome Warrior to the fold.

 

It is massively encouraging to see the football club run in a proper and profitable way, as the club continues to rebuild itself towards the place it should be both on and off the pitch. 

Heard this last night.  Forgot how much I love it.

Recruitment Mare

Not really.

I'm not suffering from the impending getting-a-proper-job nightmare just yet, but I can see the storm slowly approaching on the horizon.  

I've already delayed getting to this point once already.  This time last year, I was about to hand in my dissertation and begin the final slog towards final exams.  It wasn't until then that I even considered doing a Masters.

Staying on was heavily influenced by two factors a) the absolute misery that filled me up when I thought about the prospect of full time work, and b) the factor that my housemates were staying on to complete their legal education.  That made the decision easier than perhaps it should have been to commit to another year of education - a 17th year of consecutive education, no less - and to spending over £7000 on the course.

Another commitment, and probably the most grown up thing I've ever had to do was taking out a loan to cover the costs.  At the time, I remember thinking... pahhh! I'll worry about this in a year or so.

Annoyingly, that year or so is nearly up.

Fortunately, I've done well so far on the course and with ten weeks to go, and with four (or five) pieces of work left to do - my eye is once again cast to the getting a job.

This week, I've got a recruitment fair at uni (hence the witty blog title) where I'm hoping to find a few positions to apply for, whilst it'll be good to see what they're actually looking for.

There seems to be an every increasing pressure to get a job - not only to start paying off the nigh on crippling loan repayments (certainly off a 9 hour retail assistant contract...), but also off my friends.  The majority of which have successfully made the transition into working full time, or have just got incredible jobs lined up.  It is difficult to look at them with anything more than a touch of envy, I just hope the investment of the last year has been worth it.

With that said, I am absolutely done with education.  I think whilst the course content is good, it is dumbed down, and slowed down for the benefit of the foreign students. 

Three hour lectures.

Jesus.

Two hour lectures would be absolutely fine.  Ten weeks to go, and unimaginably depressing amount of lecture time to go.

Fingers crossed.

Nice song this.  One of the few listen-to-able songs on the work soundtrack.  Give it a go.