Thetownend.com

The STFC online store is currently offline stating “It's half time, play will resume shortly. We're busy upgrading our online store and will be back with you shortly.”

Perhaps new kits announced this week…

+they tweeted end of season sale in-store, up to 90% off.

Which is obviously good if you can actually get to the shop..

Which is obviously good if you can actually get IN to the shop..

On their defence for once if there's 90percent off I wouldn't bother selling online and bothering with postage either

Absolutely.

I'm firmly in the no money to the club camp at the moment but at 90% off I'd probably have bought something if I could view online.....but I'm not heading in just for potentially everything to be a small or a 5XL

I had a danger a few months back - because I wanted the purple shorts they didn’t actually send me the first time I ordered.

I managed to get them in large.

I only really looked at the kit but yeah as you’d imagine with an end of season sale - if your Oddjob or Fat Bastard you’re in luck…

At the risk of being off topic, it's always baffled me that end of line clothes are ALWAYS XS or 3XL.

Like, surely the clothes companies at some point realise that they make too many of the end sizes and too few Ms and readjust, maybe even over adjust so that it's hard to get big sizes for a while? Just baffles me that apparently every end of line is always bigger sizes and they just... make the same order again next year.

Up to 90% off :)

I think shirts were £15 before they went offline. Not many blue sizes left, red had better stock

Particularly with something as specific as club football shirts.
You are going to be selling to roughly the same demographic / customer base every year - so shouldn’t be a surprise as to roughly how much you sell of each size…

Clubs usually want you to spend money on high calorie foods in ground so probably hope the demographic gets bigger year on year  :D

Link? Site says NO RESULTS FOUND

XS would be snapped up by kids you would think as well.

Classic parochial Swindon, and then wondering why they don't make any money -  some of our overseas friends would clear out the store and pay a handsome postage fee!

Looking at a lot of our fans I think 3XL would be quite popular

Calling Jutty out?

4XL surely?

Should start selling club branded tents.

You would think they want rid but chance to make money is to ensure it is online - but this is stfc we are talking about

Was gonna say I'm a fat bastard but not quite that fat. Maybe I'll get on a grease diet like Homer to make the most of the savings.

Picked up all 3 of last seasons shirts for £15.

Did they have any XL left?

Is the club shop open on Saturday?

Didn’t see sorry mate only noticed no mediums.

MiPermit sponsoring us next season, club confirmed 3 kits again.

The new kit will be made by Oxen.

Gut feeling. Bit like Oxon on the shirts.

We have signed an exclusive kit deal with Pakistans' leading manufacturer of sportswear, Clemente Sports

Or its open!

10-4 opening in the week is pretty poor. You'd think the deadline for early bird  ST would be a Saturday and they'd openb on a Saturday even if it's just for 1 day only - might actually sell some puma stock too

Adidas confirmed.

So is it going to be one of the kits currently available on Pro:Direct or is there likely to be a new template to use? I quite liked our old Adidas kits and I think their latest kits are far better than the lieks of Puma and Nike.

Here's the current offering for red football shirts...

https://www.prodirectsport.com/soccer/l/mens/departments-clothing/subdepartment-teamwear/activity-football/brand-adidas/type-tops/basecolour-red/bestfor-matchday/?pg=2

I see the super sleuth has claimed that we owe money to Puma and he has had it confirmed by someone at Puma UK

Course he has

It'll have to be a template as they've left it late, but they usually are anyway. So probably one of those yeah.  

Generally prefer as plane as possible so would go with the white v neck one.

To be fair the Puma thing has been spoken about for a while.

Looking at the article and the Pro:Direct/Clubhouse website, that looks like we have agreement with a sportswear distributor who will supply us Adidas.

Does appear to be an indirect relationship to Adidas, which is perhaps because our name is muck in the industry *allegedly*.

Potentially quite interesting though, as I guess that doesn't lock you to Adidas and we could in future work with any of their brands year by year.

Yeah i know, but someone from Puma isnt going to divulge that to some random off the internet

Pro-Direct confirmed.

About as relevant to Adidas as any non-league or Sunday team.

But what about the shop sign… :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

This.

Its not as groundbreaking as some people seem to think it is

Its a pretty standard set up for lower league clubs. A quick google will confirm the same/similar deal with Exeter and Salford among others. Nothing to get hung up about.

It says closed on both sides! :)

It is Adidas then.

https://x.com/Official_STFC/status/1800509537553981631

Inspector Tadger at your service.

I *think* the pro-direct thing is the basic/cheap catalogue thing that Adidas offer to mainly non-league/sunday league sides. I assume that it was probably a quick and cheap option to allow us to break the Puma deal and get us through this season and we'll negotiate something a bit more permanent for next season.

With that said, the previous adidas efforts have been smart and *may* force me back into the club shop if their polo shirt offerings are up to scratch.

Same as ours previous as well I think. Not sure if it was Pro Direct but basically anyone with Adidas or Nike in the lower leagues tend to go through another company and pick from templates with iron on badges.

Been told it'll be like the kit from the PDC era.

Makes sense, that was the most plain and basic of the previous Adidas templates.

WE used to have amazing kits. And sponsors. The Fifa ones for example. We'll have the York rd chippy as sponsors if things don't improve on and off the pitch before too long.

So tin pot it hurts. Can someone contact Elon Musk and see if he can save us.

Article in the i I think today describing how we are sleepwalking to non-league. Hopefully someone with loads of money and the desire for a new project reads it and comes to our rescue.

Correct, but there will be an element that believe this is representative of the clubs poor management, when its standard practice.

All well and good having Adidas but since we're going to be getting a template that'll probably be shared with a few other teams up and down the leagues, it's really hard to be at all excited about it

I know they bring revenue but I can't get excited about kits full stop

The club pushing this as being "STFC x Adidas" is.... a lie, right?

Adidas are in no way involved. This is not a 'collaboration' any more than it would be if Kintbury Rangers got their kits from one of these websites, is it?

Not trying to knock a good thing (Adidas is preferable to Puma under any guise) but this is simply a distortion of the truth..

These sorts of deals are the reason why so many lower league clubs have the likes Adidas and Nike now. Never used to be that way until late 2000s. Certainly in the 90s it was a motley crew of brands from all over the world did kits in the English leagues.

Think that depends on your interpretation of 'x'. If you consider it to mean a collaboration, then yes it's a lie. If you think of it as a pairing, then it's exactly what's happening.

Id be well up for a pair of Swindon Gazelles

A lot of our Puma kits was similar to other EFL clubs it is mainly only the Prem teams who get new templates.

Which brand and year was it that we had the Swansea reject ones?  They'd simply put our sponsor over theirs or something.  As others have mentioned, standard approach these days to go via a secondary supplier.

@rob Adidas. 2011

https://thewashbag.com/2011/09/03/rebranded-swansea-city-jackets-sold-by-swindon-town/

Ps. How's Zebedee?

Rain jackets.  Goes to show we are all just a badge and sponsor name away from matching another teams kit.

Zeb is doing well, back in Swindon after a number of years living in Peckham.  If I can't find someone willing to employ me then I may return myself!

I quite like Adidas.  I wonder if I can buy the template cheap and get a badge ironed on?  Go sponsor free!

I wasn't keen on those too, it's only recently we've actually got anything bespoke

Would just prefer to get a smaller company that would actually put some effort into it

Best of luck Rob.

The one with the diamond S in was great, even though I don't like that badge. A one off

I’ve liked some of the recent Puma kits.
They’ve had a bit of individuality to them.
Think this years home kit was a miss but they get props for trying to make it unique to Swindon. Didn’t like the black trim but did love the swirl home kit.
Apart from the super plain boring white away the kit - the away and 3rd kits have been varied in colour & decent.


I guess like a lot of things - the decision is driven by money rather than how the kits looks. Think last time under Adidas we just got Middlesbroughs previous seasons home kit but with our badge & sponsors. Too generic for me…

You'd only end up giving them to a German Big Issue seller!

Interesting to see how everyone else views it. I agree that the sentiment behind last season’s home kit was good but execution a bit poor. I loved the white and black kit from season before. I liked last season’s away kit but they didn’t have it in my size (large before anyone makes the XXXXXL joke) and then when they restocked it sold out very quickly.

Haha I'd forgotten that

This. So this.

Or even a random foreign company who are fairly big but unique for the football league like Mizuno was.

Mad that a lot of people on the various social media channels are like ‘this isn’t a real deal with Adidas, we are getting template kits from a 3rd party’ like it’s some massive ‘gotcha’ loads of clubs will no doubt have the same kit deal in place as we did - plus it’s exactly what we had last time we had Adidas kits - they were all templates with 0 uniqueness about them.

Surely setting up kit manufacturing this way is just the most cost effective way of doing it.
Whilst I’ve already stated I like the unique elements of the Puma ones I expect they cost a lot more to produce; one of the pre-existing deals in place that wasn’t as financially beneficial to the club as other options I assume.

yeah out of all the things to bring up this isn't even on the scale. Its actually counterproductive as just gives ammo to the idiots talking about moaners like the Clem criticism is unjustified.

Red Adidas top in the Longelo announcement video.

Plus, it just distracts people from the real issues…

When do we think the kits will be unveiled, first pre season game or before?

Did anyone make it along to the end of season sale that the Kitmen were doing at the CG on Tuesday afternoon?  I saw they raised nearly £3k for Prospect Hospice so fair play but just wondered what kind of gear was up for grabs and for what price?

I assume it was any remaining stock and discarded training kit from the players.

March issue stuff aswell i think

Surprised to see a lot of BNWT stock on the live feed. Can imagine there's some sort of clause with the Pro Direct/adidas stock that the Puma stuff needs to be got rid of by a certain date. If it was just the jumble sale and raising money for local charities like Prospect Hospice, which was a great effort on Steve and Jonah's part from the off, then it is was it is - but i'm surprised that people don't see the club selling off a whole replica kit for about £7 (RRP twelve months ago about £80) as a huge red flag, especially when other L2 clubs are able to hold their nerve at a £15/20 price point and still clear lines. Troubling. And nothing in stock on the club site, just a few teddies, car stickers, overpriced mugs and a3 artworks of departed players and our grinning Aussie overlord.

I think you are right in assuming part of the new deal is that there's no Puma stock in the shop or online, so they have to either sell it off really cheap or landfill it.

Yeah, check the 'bury by' date on the label

Adidas training kits on the official website. Look nice

Straight from the 2023 collection on the pro direct website and currently on sale at £14.40 for an adult. This is the problem the club are going to have with this deal, people will instantly be able to see the mark up on a like for like product on the same website.

Not that I’d condone it of course but you can get heat transfers for a couple of quid now so you’ll be able to make your own copy for next to nothing if that’s your bag.

Interesting that pro direct are also sponsoring the kit - rather than a local company like we’ve had the last few years

In the announcement stated I think they mentioned as part of the deal they sponsored all training wear.

It is what it is. If people are surprised by this then i'd be shocked.

I would also like to think that they realise the profit made is what helps support the club. Sometimes its very much like the fans want a club that they dont financially support at all.

I'm also shocked at the number of people who dont realise this type of deal is what a lot of clubs do, not just non league clubs. Exeter, the shining light of fan ownership. https://www.exetercityfc.co.uk/news/2023/may/adidas

I'm not seeing anything on the OS at all, training kit or otherwise.

https://x.com/Official_STFC/status/1805326276049465616?t=c2GXMCYj_CaPr5n1ECnsNg&s=19

It'll just become another stick to hit the club with, people acting all shocked that a polyester T shirt made in a far east sweat shop and sold for 60 odd quid has quite a mark up on it.


Looks alreet dunnit, be happy with those as home and away shirts TBH

I just think with the rise of things like DHGate people are far more aware of exactly what a rip off shirts are and people are becoming far more receptive to getting or creating knock offs. At our level not really likely to be a big issue, but it’s still a risk.

As for financial support, the club currently don’t deserve any as the same questions still remain unanswered so even the guilt element of not injecting money into the club doesn’t really exist at the moment.

Ripping people off causes the issues. Remember Euro 2004 when you could get a shirt with name and numbers on for like £30 in Sports Direct? That was well below market rate for a shirt at the time and they sold shit loads. Must have made more than they make now, hardly ever see a new shirt now and when you do, people usually say they used DH gate.

Cheers Batch! Quite like that...

Chances of a kit announcement this week? First friendly on Sat, could be played in last seasons kit ( if it's not been sold off) or training wear I guess.

It’ll have to be the training gear (if no new kit appears) I can’t imagine firstly we have any Puma stock left as we would have sold it all off & secondly not sure we could wear Puma gear whilst having another kit supplier.

I am sure that Adidas/Pro Direct will be able to rustle up 30 kits bearing in mind that the template that they will be wearing is likely to be the same kit as Middlesbro or somedody else wore last season or the season before.

30 off the peg, iron on a badge and a number. Done.

A kit doesn't mean THE kit. But why delay announcing if its chosen?

I expect there was a level of scrambling due to the late hour of the final fall out with Puma

Seeing as we sold them all off before the end of June for the price of a large coffee each, I imagine we are not allowed to use or have any Puma stuff in line with the commercial agreements and likely settlement.

Training wear with quickly printed numbers maybe?

See below for a non league addidas kit, assume the same sort of deal as ours.

https://x.com/TheyThinkKits/status/1808182325991137517?t=nnc3FK-94kKjZlpB9M04SA&s=19

That's how you kit, very good.

That's very nice. The sponsor helps mind

sponsors not sticking out like a sore thumb does go a long way on a kit.

Wimbledon already the envy of the league with custom Umbro kits have now got 90s drill tops in the collection.

https://x.com/TheyThinkKits/status/1813643108317532311?t=KgEWSR4iAMD1wNbNhyG7wQ&s=19

Black and pink third kit. Actually quite like it which is annoying timing!

Love the third kit aside from the weird pink bit around the collar.

Definitely one to buy when they are £10 just before Christmas

It will probably be worn at Cheltenham next week I'd guess

Yeah. The "Collar look" puts me off.

Looks decent.

Di Canio would have never let his players eat ice cream & drink milkshakes…

We'd have done the announcement in Fratellos just over the road instead.

It’s worse when you see the full shirt

Worked so well the last time we wore a third shirt at Cheltenham for the first time.

Nice shirt apart from the weird collar bit as people have pointed out. Won't be buying for obvious reasons.

For those who think I'm too positive, it's fucking horrendous