As fan anticipation builds globally for the next Rugby World Cup, to be held in Japan in fall 2019, several licensing, sponsorship, and representation deals involving the sport, in its various forms, have come to light in the past few months. Among them:
- World Rugby and IMG named Canterbury, which outfits a number of national teams, as the official supplier of co-branded sports apparel for World Rugby and World Cup 2019, as well as a number of other related tournaments. Rights include supplying uniforms for the officials and staff and creating fan merchandise. Last fall, World Rugby appointed IMG as its master licensee.
- Rugby International Marketing and Rugby World Cup Sevens 2018 signed AEG as the global merchandise licensee for the Sevens championship held in San Francisco this summer. The agreement encompassed apparel, accessories, footwear, gifts, personal care, home goods, luggage, pet products, and toys and games. Rugby World Cup Sevens is a global event for a style of the sport featuring shorter matches and seven-person teams; the Rugby World Cup is for traditional rugby union play with 15-person teams.
- The New Zealand Black Ferns and Black Ferns Sevens, New Zealand Rugby’s women’s teams, forged a deal with Molenberg for branded playing and training shorts. This marks the first sponsorship agreement involving the country’s women’s teams only, without including the All Blacks men’s teams as well.
- The U.S. Rugby Players Association retained REP Worldwide to oversee group licensing deals and marketing activations involving both the male and female athletes of the U.S. National Teams.
- Major League Rugby, a U.S. organization that is currently in its first season of play, partnered with XBlades, an Australian brand, to produce the uniforms for the league’s seven teams and officials.
- The French Rugby Federation paired with Altrad in a sponsorship deal putting its logo on its national team’s shirt fronts. (France will host the Rugby World Cup, which occurs every four years, in 2023.)
- The Rugby Football Union teamed with Fanatics to open a newly reconfigured England Rugby Store at Twickenham Stadium, the team’s home. The venture is one component of a long-term alliance between Fanatics and the RFU, with a goal of expanding the latter’s retail and e-commerce initiatives worldwide.
- USA Rugby secured Opro to supply mouthguards for its men’s and women’s teams, in a three-year deal, as well as selling the products to grassroots programs. Opro, which works with more than 60 teams, including England Rugby and Australian Rugby, recently signed a deal with the Gaelic Athletic Association and Gaelic Players Association as well.
Nielsen Sports says there are nearly 793 million rugby followers globally, with 338 million of those considering themselves fans, the latter representing a 24% increase from 2013 to 2017. Rugby hotbeds such as England, New Zealand, and Australia have long been home to successful licensing programs tied to the sport. There is likely growth ahead for licensing in emerging rugby markets as well. These include the U.S., Brazil, China, India, and Mexico, where the collective fan base has risen 50% since 2013.
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