👕 Castore: The £750m British Brand

This past weekend KSI and Tommy Fury headlined a packed Misfits Boxing Card at the AO Arena in Manchester.

In an interview with Ariel Helwani two days before the fight Mams Taylor, President of Misfits Boxing predicted that the event will generate north of 1M PPV buys for the DAZN streaming platform at a price point of £19.99.

To put that into perspective Chris Eubank Jnr one of the more prominent Box Office stars in the country fought Liam Smith earlier this year and attracted 275,000 PPV buys on Sky Sports.

Whether you’re a fan of influencer boxing or not, that level of influence is absolutely crazy. Stay tuned for official numbers when they get released.

Today we explore the fastest growing sportswear brand in the UK.

What do Lando Norris (Formula 1 Driver), Jason Holder (West Indies Cricket Captain) and Andy Murray all have in common?

Any guesses?

Well, the answer is they all apply their trade wearing Castore - a British premium sportswear brand projected to turn over £200m this year after only 7 years of operation.

Castore is Headquartered out of Manchester and is founded by two brothers, Philip Beahon, 29 and Thomas Beahon, 32.

Philip used to play for Lancashire Cricket Club and Tom used to play for Tranmere Rovers before both moving to London to work in finance.

After raising a £3.5m round in 2018 which brought Robert Senior (CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi) and Arnaud Massenet (investor in Net-a-Porter) to the cap-table, they went on a tear signing a series of impressive sports partnerships.

• March 2019: They announced a very bold 8-year sponsorship deal with Andy Murray paying him £1m/year for 8-years and a significant stake in the business

• December 2019: They announce a 3yr deal with West Indies Cricket to be their exclusive kit supplier

This then led to a further £7.5m fundraise in late-2019 adding a raft of unnamed investors to the table.

Since then? The growth hasn’t stopped:

• May 2020: Castore announce a 5yr/£20m deal with Rangers, being their kit supplier

• November 2020: Castore replaced Adidas as the kit supplier for Wolverhampton Wanderers paying £1m/year

• December 2020: Castore replaced Nike as the kit supplier for Saracens Rugby Team paying £200,000/year

• March 2021: They announce a multi-year deal with McLaren to be their supplier for all McLaren gear

There are more too. The England Cricket Team now wear Castore. Every GB Tennis player wear Castore and since last September, Sevilla and Bayer Leverkusen have used Castore as their exclusive kit supplier.

There has not been a British clothing brand with such aggressive growth in decades.

That’s a quote from Phil Beahon, Castore’s Co-Founder in November 2021.

Fast forward and the brand has continued to go from strength-to-strength. In September 2022 Castore arranged a £50m overdraft facility valuing the business at £750m. Beahon described it as a “strong endorsement of our growth strategy” to become “the number one premium sportswear brand in the world”.

Newcastle and even Aston Villa have followed! The strategic partnerships in the UK and EU have increased the exposure of Castore allowing them to expect revenues of £200m this year!

Beahon wants the business to reach £500m in three years.

At this trajectory, it’s more than in reach!

See you next week.