We know the riders, but what do these cycling sponsors actually do?

No sponsor, no sport

The professional cycling racing season is kicking off in earnest now. We frequently hear the names of cycling teams, and we see many of the cycling sponsors’ names printed on our heroes’ jerseys. But while we recognise a lot of the names, what do the companies actually do? Below, we select a few from the 2019 peloton to keep to up to date with the companies that financially support the sport we enjoy so much.

CCC

CCC is a Polish manufacturer of shoes and bags. The company sponsors both a men’s and a women’s cycling team (yay!). This value-for-money, fast-fashion firm made 3.9 million pairs of shoes at its Polkowice factory in 2017 alone. It has a hyper-modern logistics centre, which can accommodate 18 million pairs of shoes at a time, and it can ship up to one million pairs a day, if necessary. The firm employs almost 15,000 people and also has 1,164 physical stores, visited by 263.6 million people in 2017.

EF Education First

EF Education First is a global language training and cultural exchange company founded in Sweden in 1965. It now has 52,000 employees (of which 27,500 are full- or part-time teachers) who work in 114 countries worldwide. It is headquartered in Lucerne, Switzerland and has 612 physical schools and offices in 50 countries. It is a privately-held company still owned by the founder, Bertil Hult, and members of his family. The company’s sponsorship of the cycling team “aligns perfectly with EF’s mission of opening the world through education and our commitment to bringing different cultures together”, the company has said.

Deceuninck

Deceuninck (phonetically pronounced: duh-co-nink in English) is a family-owned Belgian window company. The firm is one of the biggest makers of plastic-framed windows and doors in Europe. The company has 4,000 customers in 90 countries, and became the main sponsor of the team known as the “Wolfpack” on 1st of January, 2019. “This sponsorship is a breakthrough, which will lead to a series of marketing campaigns that symbolise our passions for innovation, ecology and design,” said Jérôme de Bruycker, Marketing Manager Europe, when the deal was sealed. As a result of its ‘circular’ approach to business, Deceuninck is also the biggest recycler of PVC in the Benelux—it recycles 20,000 tonnes of hard PVC per year. The company likely has a big cultural link with cycling, as the Deceuninck family is based in Hooglede-Gist in West Flanders, in the thick of cycling country.

Sunweb

Sunweb Group is one of the leading online travel companies in Europe. The group has a total of 13 different brands operating in seven international markets: the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, the UK, Germany and France. It is based in Zurich with a back-office in Rotterdam. Sunweb aims to deliver the best possible holiday experience, ultimately creating lifetime memories. Sunweb has been the lead sponsor of the Team Sunweb cycling team since 2017. The company believes that the best lifetime memories are created ‘wearing flip-flops’. According to the company, this philosophy links perfectly with the cycling team: “the common challenge in this partnership is to create great memories for the athletes, their fans and everyone involved in the sport of cycling.”

AG2R La Mondiale

AG2R La Mondiale is a huge French insurance company. It insures 18 million people, has 650 insurance agencies and also insures 500,000 businesses. Since January 2019, the group is officially called AG2R La Mondiale Matmut, following a merger deal. AG2R is one of the most long-standing cycling sponsors in the professional peloton—the company has sponsored a team for the past 20 years. As an insurer, AG2R sees its support of cycling because, as they company says, ‘this underlines our values of solidarity and performance’. They add: “This cycling team demonstrates record results and generates a unique and strong unity among and towards French people.” An interesting detail perhaps for the readers in the Low Countries, is that the team’s cycling kit was created by Dutch branding agency Studio Dunbar in 2009.

Mitchelton

We all know the team as Mitchelton Scott, but as most readers probably know that Scott is a brand of excellent bicycles and cycling equipment, what does Mitchelton do? Mitchelton is in fact an Australian vineyard and winery, specialised in making Shiraz, Riesling and Rhone blend wines ‘from grape to glass’. Mitchelton also has a top-of-the-range hotel of the same name, boasting a 55-metre-high tower, which features on the wine’s labels. The company’s main vineyards are on the Mitchelton Estate in Victoria. The winery itself is named after the historic Scottish explorer Sir Thomas Mitchell.

As sponsor of the men and women’s cycling team, Mitchelton said of Simon Yates’ Tour of Spain victory in 2018: “We couldn’t be happier, being the first for an Australian-owned team in history.” They added: “It’s a dream for many, and a lot of hard work has made this a reality, not without mentioning the ongoing support of our cycling community.”

Jumbo

Jumbo is a fast-growing Dutch supermarket chain with an annual turnover of €7 billion in 2017. In 2018 the company employed 60,000 people in over 600 stores. It is a family-owned chain, with all shares owned by the Van Eerd family: Karel van Eerd and his three children Frits, Colette and Monique. The cycling team shares it sponsorship with a skating team of the same name. “Jumbo has supported its skating and cycling teams for years, and we want to offer our talented sportspeople the opportunity to excel,” Colette Cloosterman-Van Eerd has said. “This partnership also offers the chance to inspire millions of our customers to live more healthily. By joining forces with these two team and our company, we can actively demonstrate our expertise in healthy nutrition and together encourage our customers to take exercise regularly.”

Segafredo

Segafredo Zanetti is the Italian market leader in espresso coffee and around the world. It is one of the world’s largest coffee producers, controlling its entire production chain and is listed on the Milan Stock Exchange. The company is a subsidiary of Massimo Zanetti Beverage Group, which is still run by the company’s founder and president, the 70-year-old Massimo Zanetti.

 

Bora

Bora is a trend-setting kitchen cooktop extractor fan manufacturer based in Niederndorf, Austria. The company was founded in 2006 by master-carpenter and inventor Willi Bruckbauer. Bruckbauer has said: “I’ve been passionate about cycling for many years! We combine things that belong together: sport, health, openness to the world, team spirit, ambition and energy. These factors are all part of Bora’s DNA, and that makes the circle complete. You wouldn’t believe how many people we’ve encouraged to get involved in cycling thanks to our commitment!” He has added that: “The members of the cycling team are also somehow part of the BORA family.”