With more than 160 years under its belt as a London football club, Crystal Palace has become a household name. According to Mikael Lijtenstein, CEO of AstroPay, the team also represents the values which are central to AstroPay’s business strategy.

Speaking to SBC News about AstroPay’s sponsorship of the Premier League team, Lijtenstein addressed the reasons why the club is the perfect partner before diving into some of the sponsorship activation opportunities available.

SBC: Can you tell us about your sponsorship agreement with Crystal Palace – what will this entail?

ML: We are currently the main training kit sponsor for CPFC and are proud to be sponsoring their training kit wear as this will help boost our brand exposure within the training grounds, as well as at warmups and pre-matches.

The partnership agreement entails AstroPay having its branding and logo visible on Crystal Palace’s training kit, as well as LED advertising at Selhurst Park on every matchday, and visibility across the club’s social media. Crystal Palace will also feature AstroPay branding on the popular PalaceTV content series, “Copers Cope TV”, which offers fans extensive footage of the club’s training sessions.

SBC: How do you plan to capitalise on the enhanced visibility that the Crystal Palace sponsorship will offer AstroPay? Can we expect some creative sponsorship activations?

ML: Having visibility on training grounds, and pre-match warm ups will enable AstroPay to gain high levels of exposure through the club’s content, particularly through the team / players being shown training on social media. 

Additionally, Patrick Vieira has recently taken over the managerial role as head coach and we believe having an iconic player like him managing the team gives us a lot to work with and capitalise from.

SBC: What is it that made Crystal Palace the perfect team to partner with?

ML: CPFC is a London based team with a global fan base, the club has over 160 years of professional experience and is one of England’s most well-known footballing institutions. Big sporting events such as the Premier League are very popular and gain massive global attention, creating exceptionally vast opportunities for sponsorship as well as having such a wide variation in viewership demographics. 

According to Statista, the global sports sponsorship market was worth an estimated US$57bn in 2020 and is expected to grow to almost US$90bn by 2027. With football undoubtedly being one of the highest grossing sports, having an estimated viewership of 4.7 billion viewers, as well as covering around 212 countries, the Premier League presents an array of opportunities to raise awareness. This is the reason why we decided to partner with key Premier League teams such as CPFC.

SBC: With the upcoming review of the Gambling Act expected to change the way gambling companies sponsor football teams in the UK, does this present new opportunities for payment providers such as AstroPay?  

ML: There are already so many opportunities to partner with sporting events or football teams in the UK and with AstroPay’s growth, we believe we are well positioned to establish new partnerships with organisations that represent our passion and ambition.  

SBC: Can we expect further sponsorships of UK football teams in the near future?  

ML: Yes, we are working on a few big opportunities, if not on a seasonal basis, something more  long term. Hopefully we will see some exciting announcements over the next few months, but at this stage we cannot disclose.