Expedia Becomes Official Sponsor of Professional Referees and Match Officials

Expedia has signed a deal to become the Official Sponsor of Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMO).

The deal will see the Expedia brand appear on the shirts of match officials at the Barclays Premier League, the npower Football League, The FA Cup with Budweiser, the Capital One Cup and other domestic, professional matches.

The one year sponsorship kicked off yesterday (Sunday, 12 August 2012), at the Community Shield at Villa Park.

The partnership gives Expedia access to over 2,500 professional football matches, with an estimated cumulative global TV audience in excess of five billion.

Dan Lynn, CEO of Expedia in Asia said, “Sports and travel connect people and bring cultures together. Football fans are immensely passionate about the game and they will travel anywhere to support their teams. At Expedia, we understand the passion and inspiration behind these trips and there is no better opportunity to showcase the breadth of Expedia’s offerings than on English football’s greatest stage, a global sport that attracts over 1.2 billion viewers across Asia.”

PGMO General Manager Mike Riley said, “We are very pleased to welcome Expedia as PGMO’s new official sponsor, the support of partners significantly helps in the training and development of officials at all levels of the game. We have a world class team of decision makers in the Select Group, which is why there have been over 80 FIFA and UEFA international appointments for Select Group referees in the past year. We are also one of only three European nations with three Elite FIFA referees: Howard Webb and Martin Atkinson have respectively taken charge of UEFA Champions League and Europe League semi-finals, and now we have Mark Clattenburg officiating the Olympic Men’s Final. With the standard of officiating improving season on season, it’s a good time for Expedia to partner with us.”

Expedia will use additional marketing spend to reinforce the positive impact of good decision making, highlighting how online travel technology has empowered people to take control of their own travel experiences.

Through the partnership Expedia hopes to connect with customers and highlight how it can help people to make the right travel decisions for their unique needs.

The partnership delivers a range of designation and promotional rights, including shirt and training-wear branding on all professional match referees, assistant referees and fourth officials, branding and accreditation on all publicity material, PGMO and all governing body websites, as well as match official and refereeing inventory.

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