Football shirts: How much does it cost to manufacture a Premier League club's shirt?

You may be surprised by the breaking down of the price for a Premier League team's jersey

This week it was announced that Lionel Messi’s World Cup-winning Argentina shirt would sell at auction for $10 million. An image of Dr. Evil comes to mind when considering the amount of money, the shirt will sell for, “10 million dollars!” One (lucky?) sports fan will walk away with the iconic football jersey.  

While I can think of more worthwhile things to do with $10m, I assume the eventual buyer will either A) buy the shirt as an investment for the future, or B) fulfil a dream of wearing Messi’s sweat-soaked jersey.  

Since Netflix’s 1990s nostalgia-fest documentary, “The Last Dance” was released, the sports collectables market has seen a new lease on life. When I was a tweener in the early 1990s, I loved going to sports card stores and conventions, looking to buy baseball, basketball, or football cards of my favourite players. I also sought out Starting Lineups, the old collectable sports figures that were sold in toy stores but were marked up to incredible sums by unscrupulous collectors trying to create a false economy.  

I wonder if those figures are worth anything today? I assume in the packaging they are still worth a decent amount, but what is the fun in buying something and leaving it in the packaging? 

The David Beckham documentary, which I wrote about previously on Drew FC, could spark another love affair with fans clamouring for sports collectables. We’ve already seen the Beckham love affair thanks to the Netflix documentary, with Edward Norton and The Rock dressing up like Beckham for Halloween. One of those actors did it far better than the other.   

But Messi’s shirt being auctioned off for $10m got me thinking about football jerseys. I, myself, have a healthy collection of shirts, in the triple digits. I love football shirts and routinely purchase them from various outlets. This is the ideal time for Classic Football Shirts to endorse me.   

My collection, which is partly made up of Liverpool shirts from over the last decade-plus, doesn’t feature any classic shirts or previously worn tops. It is mostly just shirts I see and fancy. Right now, my main interest is buying jerseys from lower-league American soccer teams. I recently added an Oakland Roots Black Panthers special release. It sits nicely next to my Forward Madison reversible jersey. I’ve also got my eye on a special release from New Amsterdam FC.   

I’m just one of many people around the world who regularly buys football shirts. I live my life much like I did when I was a kid and teenager. I collect sports jerseys, WWE wrestling figures, and play video games. But one thing I don’t do when buying a football shirt is pay full price (unless it is a Liverpool top). Thanks to websites like Classic Football Shirts (another plug!) I typically add shirts from previous seasons to my collection that are discounted in price.   

Football shirts are outrageously priced these days. Although buying a sports jersey has always been expensive. Unfortunately, despite advances in appearance and technology, you can only wear a football shirt on a limited number of occasions. Personally, I want to wear mine out and about for everyone to see. Wearing a football shirt around the house just doesn’t do it for me. So, when buying a shirt, I take into consideration how often I will wear it.  

With so many football shirts just hanging in my wardrobe, sitting in dressers, or packed in storage, I’m often reminded how much money I’ve spent on my collection.  

In the summer of 2023, it was reported that the price of Premier League teams’ kits rose 10%. Arsenal and Manchester United sold their kits to fans for £80 ($100) ahead of the season. An NFL jersey available from Fanatics costs £60 to £80 currently, so the two sports tops aren’t too far off in price.   

But how much does it cost for a Premier League team to have their shirts manufactured? Well, the price will hopefully surprise you, because it doesn’t cost very much at all.   

Footy Headlines did a great breakdown of the cost of a Premier League football shirt, which gives great insight into where the money goes. As Detective Lester Freamon famously said on The Wire, “You follow drugs, you get drug addicts and drug dealers. But you start to follow the money, and you don't know where the fuck it's gonna take you.” So, let’s follow the money to see where it takes us but with football shirts and not drugs.  

The cost of a football shirt to be produced in a factory in Asia is £8. Manufacturing often takes place in a factory in Asia, but it can be done elsewhere, like South or Central America.  

The football club will earn between £4 and £6 per shirt as part of their licensing fee. The retailer will get around £26 and the brand (Adidas, Nike, Puma) gets just over £23 per sale. Tax makes up a little over £13 of the price. Approximately £2.40 per shirt is for marketing, and another £1.60 is paid for local distribution.   

Clubs can benefit in another way financially from shirt sales. If the club’s retail store, for example, the Liverpool FC megastore or online shop, sells the shirt to a buyer, then they will receive the retailer’s portion.  

This can take their total per shirt sold to more than £30. That money adds. So, if a club sells 1,000 shirts from their retail shop, they can earn £30,000. But if a club is massive, for example, Man United, they may sell 10,000 shirts from their retailer, which is £300,000. Sure, this would only pay Marcus Rashford for one week of work, but it could pay the salaries of other employees for months. Just image if they sell more shirts.  

You may wonder, who sets the price of a football shirt? The manufacturer (Adidas, Nike, Puma) will set the price of the shirt, so when you buy your next shirt from the Chelsea megastore, you can curse Nike for the cost.  

This is sometimes why we see shirt prices differ depending on the size of the brand. For example, Nike’s shirts are often at the top of the price range. However, tops from brands that are relatively small and/or unheard of may fetch lower prices. For example, eco-friendly club Forest Green Rovers are selling their Umbro-made shirts for just £45 this season on their webstore. Want to support a cool lower-league team and wear a cool shirt? Then pick up an FGR’s top. 

Looking at the price broken down is eye-opening but consider the price of a Premier League jersey compared to the price to make a pair of Air Jordan shoes. According to my research, the materials to make the shoes cost $10.75, the labour is $2.43, the overhead to produce them is $2.10, and the factory earns a profit of $0.97 per pair of shoes. The final product, a pair of adult-sized Air Jordans, is then sold for $125 or more.   

Despite the prices increasing, sports fans won’t stop buying football shirts, or Air Jordans for that matter. Why? Because we will find another way to save money, allowing us to keep adding to our collections, supporting our teams, or keeping up with the Joneses.