Cristiano Ronaldo shot to fame in 2003 when he signed for Manchester United aged 18. During his first season, United won the FA cup before going on to win the Premier League title for three consecutive years, the FIFA Club World Cup and the UEFA Champions League.
Today, he’s one of the most famous sports stars in the world, and he’s put his fame to good use. Endorsing a number of products (getting plenty of money through sponsorship in the process), he’s even gone as far as launching his own branded products. Today, Forbes value the Cristiano Ronaldo brand at $8,000,000, making it one of the world’s most valuable sports brands.
But what products has Cristiano Ronaldo been involved with, and what else has he got in the pipeline?
Sponsorships
If we mentioned all of Ronaldo’s sponsorships, we’d be here all day. However, the main one is, unquestionably, Nike – and as far as sports stars are concerned, it’s the biggest sponsorship deal in the world, worth a reported $1 billion.
He also replaced David Beckham as Armani’s endorsement, and became the brand ambassador for Castrol (worth £8.2m for the first two years, extended for £5.5m afterwards) and Tag Heuer. Other sponsorship deals include KFC, Coca-Cola and the airline, Emirates.
Furthermore, with casino slot games rising in popularity, it seemed only fair that he became involved in this industry, too. Players can win at football slots, while their hero, Ronaldo, features heavily. Ronaldo is no stranger to the gambling scene, he has promoted online casinos, and so featuring on a slot game was a natural progression.
CR7 Brand
As well as helping other brands out by offering them his endorsements, he’s also got his own brand – CR7. Named after the man himself, of course, this brand started out as a range of underwear but has since expanded into a number of different categories, including footwear, sportswear and socks.
He also owns his own hotels – one on the island of Madeira in his hometown of Funchal and in the capital city of Portugal, Lisbon.
Cristiano and his brand have an immense online following as well, with over 64 million followers on Twitter alone.
7EGEND
Last but by no means least is Ronaldo’s latest purchase – a majority stake in Thing Pink, a Portuguese digital agency. His aim is to create an innovative tech brand from which he can launch new tech products, renaming the company to 7EGEND. Although it’s rumoured to be a continuation of Thing Pink, it’s clear Ronaldo has ground-breaking plans for the new brand with the stand-alone tech products it’ll produce. The agency itself has already been involved in a variety of prestigious projects, including developing smartphone applications for FNAC, McDonald’s and Fuetbol Clube do Porto.
With investments in a wide range of areas, from hospitality to food and watches, Ronaldo’s certainly making the most of his fame – and we’ve not even mentioned the fact he earns £440,000 a week at Real Madrid, which makes him one of the highest paid footballers in the world.
