Balancing recognition and novelty: exploring the brand architecture of integrated football clubs in the English Women’s Super League

Research has demonstrated that integrated women’s football teams which exist within pre-established team brand architecture create associations with the men’s team in the same club. Emerging evidence also supports that fans of women’s football hold unique brand associations with the women’s team in comparison to men’s football. The decision-making process informing the degree of differentiation within integrated club brand architecture has not been studied. This is an important gap given the centrality of marketing and sponsorship to team revenue. Through a qualitative study of the English Women’s Super League (WSL) undertaken between 2022 and 2023, this research aimed to explore the brand architecture decisions made by integrated women’s football clubs and adopted brand extension theory. Based on analysis of 20 interviews with industry stakeholders from the WSL, which examined how and why integrated club brand architecture influences WSL team sub-brand decisions, two key dimensions were created. First, the decision to strategically align with the master brand (i.e. recognition) is motivated by helping fans and sponsors associate the women’s club with professional sport and club heritage. Second, the decision to promote novel associations (i.e. differentiation) to access new fan segments and commercial opportunities. Practically, our findings contribute to the commercialisation of women’s football through an enhanced understanding of branding complexities and strategy. Theoretically, we further develop the factors that influence the tensions within pre-established team brand architecture.