Manchester City has conquered pretty much everything in its path.
Now, the club is setting out for another new horizon: the United States.
Playing in the English Premier League, Man City has won four straight league titles.
They won their first UEFA Champions League (a tournament amongst the best teams in Europe) title last year, and along with an FA Cup (a tournament amongst teams in England at all levels) title last year, they secured a much-heralded “treble.”
Though they came up short in the Champions league and FA Cup this year, they made history as the first team to ever win four straight Premier League titles.
Man City is looking to capitalize on all that success and a burgeoning American fandom with a pop-up team store in Rockefeller Center, which will be open throughout the summer.
The store will coincide with Man City’s preseason tournament in America, namely a friendly match against Italian power AC Milan at Yankee Stadium on July 27.
“We’ve seen tremendous growth in our sales from the online store to the U.S,” Serenba Gosling, Man City’s Director of Licensing and Retail, told The Post. “We also have a store on Amazon U.S. and we have a very active official supporters club in New York. All those things, combined with a great location for the right period, combined for us to say ‘this is a place to really go for.’
“It has a really great tourist footfall. I think it’ll be great for tourists during the summer period, as well as our fans that live in the New York area.”
Man City has noticed its fandom grow exponentially in recent years, particularly among younger fans.
The club’s new home jersey for next year will be available at the store, something Man City has a proven track record of growing sales in from American consumers.
“The global growth has been stellar, but the U.S. as a market has over-indexed even the total growth that we’ve known,” Gosling said. “Last year, from the start of the new season to now, we’ve seen a 48 percent increase year-in-year in sales to the U.S. That gives a great confidence. Even within those sales, we’ve seen a big increase in sales of kids kits, which is really interesting. That shows the interest is coming from the next generation, new fans coming on board.
“Americans, as with most people, really like success. Winning four Premier Leagues in a row has really helped us grow our fanbase and appeal even more to a U.S. customer.”
Of course, Man City is looking for financial success with the new store.
But beyond that, the club is looking to provide a memorable experience to continue building relationships with new fans.
“I think that’s an experience that’s difficult to replicate online,” Gosling said. “That kind of feeling of going in, choosing your own name, choosing a player’s name, going through the personalization experience. Day in and day out we see people who come to visit the stadium, they do a stadium tour, and that’s part of the deal. To take a bit of that to another place in the world and allow fans to come and enjoy it, it will give us a better opportunity to engage with the New York official supporters club, who are fabulous, they host amazing events every week to watch games over there in New York. I want them to enjoy it.
“We obviously want it to be a commercial success, but it’s about a little bit more than that for us. It’s about creating an experience for people in the city.”
