What Is Neymar’s Ambition With Puma?

Neymar da Silva Santos Junior, well known as Neymar, is a Brazilian professional football player. Neymar Jr., is regarded as one of the best players in the world. Here we will be discussing the announcement of the partnership between PUMA and Neymar Jr., made through NR Sports.

Puma has signed a deal with Neymar Jr., signaling the German sporting goods firm’s ambition to challenge its competitors Nike and Adidas on the soccer field. Nike has Cristiano Ronaldo and Adidas has Lionel Messi but Puma has lacked the global star since Usain Bolt retired from sports. Now Neymar will wear the Puma King football boot on the pitch. He will be the ambassador for its lifestyle, training, and sport-inspired footwear and apparel products off-pitch.

Bjørn Gulden, chief executive officer of Puma said, “Neymar Jr. joining our Puma family is fantastic. He is one of the best players in the world and extremely influential for the global football and youth culture. We are very excited and look forward to working with him both on and off the pitch.”

Neymar has shared a post on social media accounts titled “ The King Is Back”, Neymar wrote he was inspired by Puma’s previous partnerships with soccer legends Pelé and Diego Maradona.

“I grew up watching videos of great football legends such as Pelé, Cruyff, Matthäus, Eusébio, and Maradona. These were the Kings of the pitch, the Kings of my sport. I wish to bring back the legacy that those athletes created on the pitch. They each played in Puma, and each of them created their magic in The King.”

Neymar signed his very first deal with Nike when he was only 13 years old in 2005 and played for the youth team of Santos F.C., one of the biggest clubs in Brazil. Neymar has joined PUMA for $30 million annually in 2020 after breaking the alliance with Nike before his contract had expired. Neymar’s announcement of signing to the Puma family was a new record for the company in its official social media accounts, they were filled with new followers, mentions, and high engagement. 44 social media channels posted the news of the partnership that brought 58,3 million impressions and 2,95 million of engagement during three days (From September 12 to 15 of 2020).

Clément Lacour, PUMA’s Team head Marketing Teamsport & Key Project Lead (Neymar Jr) said,

“We decided to use him on all our different social accounts from different categories at the same time and his announcement posts were the most engaging posts ever on 6 of our PUMA channels on Instagram. In the first 6 months of the partnership, we had 500k new followers on our @PUMAFootball account on Instagram and Brazil is our number 1 fanbase on the platform.”

“A 13,5% growth in six months in only one of the accounts mentioned. What’s impressive, however, is the speed at which this happened. With Neymar Jr., the average of fans on @PUMAFootball, on Instagram, was almost 84 thousand per month. “When signing Neymar Jr. we knew we were adding one of the most famous and followed people in the world and this is a very clear reflection on his impact”, Clément Lacour added.