Norwich City replaces Dafabet with BK8 Sports as shirt sponsor
The deal will cover the 2021-22 season, with the BK8 logo to feature on the front of players’ shirts and training kits throughout the campaign.
Norwich City will also work with BK8 on a range of activations for supporters.
“BK8 will undoubtedly be a new brand for City fans, however, they’re a well trusted name across Asia,” Norwich chief operating officer Ben Kensell said. “The Premier League has an accumulative TV audience of over three billion and is broadcast into over a billion homes – a huge proportion of these Premier League fans are based in Asia.
“Supporting BK8 in marketing to this global Premier League fanbase equally affords us as a club the opportunity to further our own exposure and commercial efforts into those markets.”
As part of the deal, former Norwich City player Darren Eadie has joined BK8 as a brand spokesperson and will help support and drive engagement.
“BK8 shares the club’s aspiration to seek continuous improvement,” Eadie said. “It is the undying desire to achieve greater heights in an unforgiving environment that brought us together.”
Confirmation of the new agreement comes after City concluded its shirt sponsorship deal with online gambling operator Dafabet.
The operator had served as the team’s principal partner since the 2019-20 season, in a deal the club described as a record commercial agreement.
Dafabet branding appeared on the team’s shirt for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 seasons, but the team will now seek a new principal partner ahead of its return to the Premier League for the 2021-22 campaign.
“Over our 2019-20 Premier League campaign we announced record commercial revenue for the football club,” Kensell said. “More recently, we’ve also enjoyed a very successful Championship season throughout the challenges of pandemic.
“Throughout that period Dafabet have been fantastic supporters. As a club with a clear model, the contribution of our official partners and the team at Dafabet has been crucial. As the partnership comes to an end, we thank them tremendously for their support and wish them well.”
Dafabet chief executive Dimitris Karatzas added: “We’ve had a great couple of years working with Norwich City and I am pleased to see the club returning where it belongs, the Premier League.
“During the past two years, we connected with the team running the club in so many ways, establishing relationships that have far exceeded our expectations.”
Dafabet has a number of other sports sponsorship deals in place, including agreements with Scottish Premier League club Celtic and Spanish La Liga team Cadiz, while the operator last month signed an extended deal to remain as title sponsor of the World Pool Masters for the 2021 event.