Various football leagues across Europe, including the English Premier League (EPL), are taking a stricter stance on gambling advertising, with many of them disposing of gambling ads. However, for the time being, it remains unknown whether or not Scotland will decide to follow suit.
The thing is that football clubs in Scotland are unable to survive on TV money alone. Unfortunately for them, two major areas of income – gambling and alcohol – have been closely scrutinised over the last few years, and Scottish football clubs are known for being heavily dependent on both. Currently, more than 50% of the top football clubs in Scotland rely on partnership agreements with both alcohol and gambling companies in some form.
As recently explained by Dr Richard Purves of the University of Stirling’s Institute for Social Marketing and Health, Scottish football clubs literally survive on gambling and alcohol firms’ money due to the huge visibility of their branding received as a result of such partnerships. Dr Purves revealed that both industries relied on the marketing impact which such agreements have on people and their behaviour and raising people’s engagement with their products.
For a few years, Dr Purves and his colleagues have been researching customer behaviour linked to gambling, alcohol and other vices. The results of their studies are being unveiled at a time when there is a growing concern about the impact of various addictions, including the ones to gambling and alcohol, have on people, especially in financially disadvantaged communities.
Scottish Football Clubs Urged to Follow EPL Suit and Restrict Gambling and Alcohol Companies’ Partnerships
On the other hand, gambling and alcohol sponsors to professional sports clubs, and football, in particular, have long been associated with controversy. Years ago, the same concerns emerged in terms of tobacco companies, and now gambling and alcohol firms are being blamed for making addictions worse by targeting vulnerable groups and individuals, especially younger audiences.
Currently, there are fewer alcohol companies as football clubs’ shirt sponsors because their names have been replaced by some gambling and betting giants to a large extent.
As Casino Guardian previously reported, the UK Government has already moved forward, unveiling some proposals aimed at restricting the promotion of gambling products. As a result, the EPL has already announced that all football clubs need to remove gambling logos from the front of their shirts by the 2026/2027 season.
Other leagues and sports are also under pressure to follow suit and make sure they reduce their partnership agreements with gambling and alcohol companies. If Scottish football clubs decide to take such a move, this would mean that a number of leading clubs in the country would have to sacrifice some lucrative shirt sponsorship agreements. And, as mentioned above, shirt sponsorships have meant a lot to football, although this does not mean that football is the only promotional channel for the betting sector, it is only one of the most prominent ones.
Gambling sponsorship deals became extremely popular across the UK as a result of the liberalisation of the country’s Gambling Act in 2005. As previously noted, more than 50% of all clubs in the English Premier League and Championship had displayed gambling companies’ logos on their shirts by the 2018/2019 season. When it comes to Scotland, all four senior leagues and both major cup tournaments in the country, along with three of the four professional English leagues, had gambling companies as sponsors.
According to a Match of the Day study, viewers were usually exposed to a total of 250 instances of gambling marketing per episode, although the industry has been trying to self-regulate. This basically means there is undoubtedly public interest to see fewer gambling adverts across all kinds of advertising channels, with anti-gambling lobby trying to persuade the Government to make sure stricter regulation of gambling and gambling advertising is unveiled.
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Olivia Cole
