The recent sell-out at FNB Stadium was another reminder of the pulling power of these two South African sports brands and their resulting commercial appeal.
Very few all-South African sports events find themselves in the fortunate position of being able to stick up the “sold out” boards four days before the event takes place.
On top of that, for a fixture in a 94 000-capacity stadium.
But that’s the power of the Soweto Derby and more specifically, the power of the Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates brands, and that’s what happened a couple of weeks ago, when Stadium Management South Africa declared the latest derby a sell-out on the Tuesday before the Saturday fixture.
“Nothing connects the human spirit, when it comes to football, like when it comes to these two teams,” says Openfield Marketing’s Kabelo Mkhonto, Account Director for the Vodacom Soccer account. “It’s the only local game that gives you 90 000 supporters in one stadium and there is no better way to speak to this number of football supporters, pushing one message, and this is what these two teams give you.”
And what they give you is bums on seats, even if those who attended the latest derby claim that FNB Stadium wasn’t 100% full.
According to Stadium Management SA, 91 250 fans attended the game and that’s still a pretty impressive number – no surprise, then, that Vodacom has thrown a sizeable portion of its sponsorship budget at the Soweto giants and sponsors both teams, making for an interesting challenge for its agency Openfield.
“It’s a sponsorship of the two biggest brands, not just in South African football, but South African sport,” says Mkhonto. “They are competing brands, but as much as that, they are also connected – they are both the ‘Soweto Giants’. With both of them, you go anywhere in the country and they are incredibly well-supported, and if you want reach or exposure across South Africa, there are no other two brands who will give you that.”
Just to put that into context – 91 250 may have turned up at FNB Stadium, but a further 6 580 518 tuned in to watch the Soweto Derby on TV, according to Nielsen Sports South Africa, the leading sports measurement and analytics player.
Their research suggests that 2 171 921 caught the game on SuperSport and 4 408 597 on the SABC, and if you tally those numbers with the in-stadium head count, it’s fair to say that roughly 11% of South Africa’s population of 60 million took an interest in the latest clash between Chiefs and Pirates.
“Interestingly, whilst those numbers are impressive, our research shows that over 11.2 million people watched the November 2019 Soweto Derby and the number dropped steadily in the games that followed – 9.8m (February 2020); 8m (January 2021); 7.3m (March 2021); and 4.2m (November 2021) – before starting to climb back up again in March (4.6m)”, says Jean Willers, Managing Director of Nielsen Sports South Africa.
Nielsen does suggest that those last two fixtures were quite heavily affected by loadshedding, so take those numbers with a pinch of salt.
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Regardless, they are still impressive numbers and are another reminder of the commercial pull of these two sports teams. If you’re a brand and you’re looking to take a particular message or product to South African football fans and the market segments they dominate, then the derby is an attractive option.
Just ask Vodacom, which 10 years ago committed to paying the Soweto giants R1 billion over five years for sponsorship of the two teams, with each club getting roughly R100 million a year. No wonder Pirates Chairman Irvin Khoza and his Chiefs counterpart Kaizer Motaung said at the time that their brands were “bigger than the 7pm news”, according to sowetanlive.co.za.
It stands to reason then that the Soweto Derby is a pretty decent money-spinner.
Stadium Management SA refused to divulge details of the numbers generated by the most recent derby, but with hospitality packages ranging from R850 at the low end to R6 995 for a ‘VIP Package’, you do the maths.
Significantly, the support for Chiefs and Pirates runs deep and is certainly not linked to form, as has been shown over the years, particularly when the two teams have found themselves far off challenging for the league title. As it stands, they currently lie fourth and fifth in the DStv Premiership, but even when they are struggling to produce good results or are going through any sort of slump, there remains no bigger game in local football and their supporter bases dwarf that of any of the other PSL clubs.
“The gap to the ‘other’ teams is massive,” says Mkhonto. “Chiefs and Pirates, regardless of where they’re playing in the country, they are the only teams that make sure that every stadium is filled to capacity. Sure, Sundowns are the most successful team in the PSL era, but as a nation, we’ve always valued culture, history etc, and Chiefs and Pirates give you exactly that. Their legacy is unmatched, and that’s why you see week in, week out, their supporters filling stadiums.”
That history goes back 52 years to 1970, when Motaung, a former Pirates player, former Kaizer Chiefs, on his return from playing in the United States.
The rest, they say, is history, with Chiefs and Pirates going on to dominate the hearts and minds of the majority of South African football fans over the ensuing five decades.
No wonder, then, that their supporter bases are so strong and the numbers so impressive.
But, whilst the numbers don’t lie, Willers believes the Soweto giants shouldn’t rest on their laurels, for a couple of reasons.
“PSL viewership numbers have been on the decrease over the past two seasons,” he says. “The quality of the PSL and the quality of South African football has to improve, otherwise fans are not going to attend or watch. They now have access to global football across both SuperSport and SABC Sport, and so the fans have choice – they want quality football and quality entertainment on their screens and in the stadium.”
Interesting take.
Dylan Rogers