Newcastle United Fanzone – Sponsor to be announced very soon? | OneFootball

It’s safe to say that since the new Newcastle United owners have taken over the club, they have hardly put a foot wrong.

I had to laugh this week when the club announced that they were creating a Newcastle United Fanzone (in conjunction with STACK) on the land at Strawberry Place behind the Gallowgate End, a suggestion I made over a year ago.

Proves they’re listening to the fans via telekinesis, are psychic, or infiltrating The Mag for good ideas.

This Newcastle United Fanzone will be a place where supporters can go and eat, drink and watch matches on TV, so a bonus for those that can’t actually get into the ground or travel away to watch the team.

Positive news aplenty ahead of the new season then.

As this news broke, I was catching up with the clips of events going on over in the USA, where Shay Given, Shola Ameobi and Darren Eales were doing an excellent job of promoting the club at fan events in Miggy Almiron’s former home of Atlanta, as he returned to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

This got me thinking.

Mike Ashley’s idea of fighting a fire (usually of his own creation) seemed to be to throw a hand grenade at the problem and in turn annoy fans even further. One such disaster was the rebranding of St James’ Park in 2011 to the S….. D….. Arena.

If anything was going to make an unpopular person more unpopular  it was this move. (Good) PR was never his thing despite employing people to oversee such things.

Like I said earlier, I was in thinking mode.

A club looking for increased revenue and sponsorship?

A Newcastle United fanzone?

Humming and hawing over attaching naming rights to the ground without upsetting fans?

It doesn’t take a business strategist to join the dots. Combine the lot and give the Newcastle United Fanzone and naming rights to whoever bids for such a privilege and in turn utilising the moniker “@StJamesPark”.

Pick your company. Mercedes-Benzfanzone@StJamesPark. Sonyfanzone@StJamesPark. The dreamland scenario for me would be to replace the uninspiring Castore and have Adidasfanzone@StJamesPark. Shirts, fans, food, drink, you could write your own cheque.

There IS a catch.

It’s possible that new club sponsor SELA will want exclusivity on their affiliation with the Newcastle United Fanzone and STACK – but what’s stopping the club getting another sponsor?

Other clubs have many partners and sponsors and even if the deal can be reached where SELA can share rights to the fanzone, then we’ve cracked it. Surely SELA would welcome being affiliated with another big name brand. The more the merrier, richer and financially viable.

The Newcastle United Fanzone is a great idea (I’ll take partial credit) but getting a massive brand attached to it and all the benefits that comes with it, could be a masterstroke.