New beer for Premier League football

The Premier League has announced that Carling is to be its new official beer sponsor of the top-flight football competition, replacing Carlsberg.

The Molson Coors-owned beer brand will be the official beer of the Premier League from June this year until the end of the 2018/19 season.

The new deal harks back to the early days of Premier League, which was established in 1993 as a separate entity to the Football League, when Carling was its original title sponsor until 2001.

It was also the sponsor of the Carling Cup for nine seasons from 2003 to 2012.

The Premier League is the most watched continuous annual sporting event in the world. Last season, 13.9 million fans attended matches with record average stadium occupancy of 95.9%.

Across nine months of the year, 380 matches are viewed in 185 countries with coverage available in over 730 million households.

It is not known how much Carling has paid for the deal, but Barclays, the bank that has been the title sponsor of the Premier League since 2001, paid £120 million for the four years between 2012 and 2016.

Jim Shearer, Carling brand director for Molson Coors said: “We are bringing together the UK’s leading beer with the world’s most exciting football brand to rekindle a unique partnership.

“This exciting partnership will allow Carling to simultaneously champion pubs and bars via access to the nation’s favourite sport, whilst supporting growth within the off-trade by providing shoppers access to a range of brilliant Premier League assets.

“Together with our large network of pubs and retailers, we’ll be finding ways to use our unique access to the Premier League, alongside our existing partnership with Sky, to give Carling drinkers more reasons to get together and keep the stories going long after the final whistle has blown.”

Premier League managing director, Richard Masters, said: “We are very pleased that Carling has chosen to partner with the Premier League for the next three seasons.

“They have some exciting plans for engaging fans in pubs and homes across the country and their track record of sponsoring top level football, including the Premier League itself, will make them a great fit as our Official Beer Partner.

“The compelling football put on by our clubs this season is providing a fantastic platform for the League to take forward its new sponsorship strategy.”