The MHP giants of Ludwigsburg are always looking for new sponsors. But now it’s the other way around. The Bundesliga basketball team adorns the shirt front of the district football club TV Pflugfelden. There are good reasons for the unusual partnership.
Ludwigsburg. There must have been a few surprised faces in the dressing room of the district football club TV Pflugfelden last Sunday. At least that’s what the deputy head of department, Achim Schreiber, reports. When the newly flocked TVP jerseys were pulled out of the bag, the logo of the basketball Bundesliga giant MHP Ludwigsburg was freshly printed. “The players were of course flabbergasted and amazed. There are some basketball freaks who play in their free time. A lot of people asked themselves what the logo on our chest was doing.” The premiere of the result failed: Pflugfelden lost 0:2 to SV Gebersheim. Nevertheless, a success story could have begun.
An old friend contacts Reil
In fact, an unusual partnership has emerged between the top basketball club and the amateur soccer club. Usually it’s the giants who offer their advertising space to local companies. Now it was the other way around. Rolf Maier came up with the idea of asking the giants and so the phone rang for the 1st chairman, Alexander Reil.
The project did not come entirely from the gut. Reil used to play in defensive midfield at TVPflugfelden and, like Schreiber and Maier, was part of the championship team in 1991 when TVP was promoted to the A district league. “We thought it was a cool idea,” explains Reil. After an internal consultation, the giants decided to become the new shirt sponsor in Pflugfelden. In addition to two sets of jerseys, the commitment includes a fixed amount and lasts for two years. “It’s all within a manageable framework,” emphasizes Reil. In the district league, it’s usually not about big money anyway. And with four points from four games so far, the TVP has not raised this suspicion anyway.
More presence in the region
However, the commitment cannot be reduced to old acquaintances alone. “It’s about taking on social responsibility, but we’re also constantly on the lookout for new target groups, and local football naturally has a great appeal there,” says former midfield strategist Reil. “It’s about real cooperation taking place.”
This includes the TVP taking 40 cards each season. Schreiber goes even further: “We also like to go to basketball with youth teams in order to make this sport more transparent.” . Furthermore, former and active soccer players of TV Pflugfelden regularly attend the home games.” Reil used to attend the games of the Ludwigsburg basketball team with former teammates before he became full-time chairman in 2002.
The giants hope that the advertising on the Pflugfelden jerseys will also increase their presence in the region. After all, the TVP is a guest on many sports fields in the catchment area of the MHP giants. Due to the restrictions imposed by the coronavirus pandemic, viewers were sometimes completely banned. Since then, the giants have been struggling to return to pre-pandemic attendance levels, when games in the MHP Arena sold out in rows with just over 4,000 spectators. The Ludwigsburg start on October 2nd at the MLP Academics Heidelberg in the Bundesliga.
