(by Marcel André Vulpis) – Last March 19thon the occasion of the “Classic” (traditional challenge with all-time rivals Real Madrid), the Barcelona took the field with a special jersey. The idea started directly from Spotify (Swedish audio streaming platform) main shirt sponsor of the azulgranawhich involved the singer in the design of the game uniform Rosalia. The latter, just the day before the match (March 18, 2023), celebrated one year since the release of her latest album (“Motomami“: disco of experimental pop genre/reggaeton alternative). The Spanish artist is the most streamed (in 2022) right on Spotify and is very popular in the Catalan community.
Two product lines were designed and created for the occasion. The first (in addition to the logo of “Motomami”the name of the singer appears on the back Rosalia paired with the number “1”) counts 1899 pieces (the number coincides with the year the club was founded); the second just 22 pieces (each shirt costs approx 2 thousand euros also because it features a renamed special effect “glow-in-the-dark puff” and is signed by the Blaugrana eleven). In the first case, however, the price does not exceed i 400 euros and can be purchased on the official Barcelona store.
More generally, it is the second collaboration with a famous artist, as had already happened previously with the “OVO” line by Drake (34-year-old Canadian rapper, singer, record producer and actor with US citizenship). The clothing brandOctober’s Very Own“ (OVO) was born from the minds of Drake and his manager Oliver El Khatib. Since its inception in 2011, OVO has been a project born to combine charm pop to inspiring details street style.
The Toronto artist also gave up the use of the logo of his clothing line (the now popular “owl”) for the creation of a shirt also in this case combined with the “Clàsico” (on October 16, 2022). Drake (winner, for the record, of 4 Grammy awards) was chosen by the top management of the club not only for being a super-fan, but also and above all for being the first artist to break through the wall of 50 billion plays on the Spotify platform.
On the other front, Barça’s operation is certainly a winner, because Rosalia is now part of the world showbiz. The artist has in fact announced her engagement to the singer-songwriter Rauw Alejandro (renamed, by the trade press, as the new Beyoncé and Jay-Z). It was all announced in the video of kissed (is part of their first work together, released worldwide on Friday March 24th). A new successful hit that will certainly be boosted by the combination with the blaugrana colors, of which Rosalìa has always been a supporter.
More generally, Spotify is confirming that it wants to revolutionize the way of sponsoring a football club of the level of Barcelona. In fact, marketing and creativity are always at the center of special initiatives to better engage the fan base.
To date, the blaugrana have collected 55 million euros from Rakuten (main sponsor of the shirt), 10 million from Beko (sleeve sponsor of the first team) and 3.5 million from Stanley for the women’s selection shirts. It is the most important economic agreement in the history of the Catalan company and will help offset the heavy debt level (currently estimated at 1.35 billion euros). Thanks to this operation, the Catalan reality becomes the highest paid club in terms of shirts, even if the part destined to the “naming rights” of the Camp Nou must be included in the (estimated) 93 million euros (on the model Etihad airways-Manchester City or Emirates -Arsenal).
For the Swedish music service, which offers it on-demand streaming of a selection of tracks from various independent record companies and labels (including Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group and Universal), was a real debut in the world of sports. It is estimated that Spotify has a turnover of more than 8.7 billion euros (with a customer portfolio of 365 million users worldwide).
