The Welsh side comes to Miami Beach to discuss their success
Miami Beach, FL- Another Soccerex story from the 2025 convention at the Miami Beach Convention Center, as Chief Executive Officer Michael Williamson was joined by Mary Bayne from United Airlines came to discuss the exclusive partnership between the Welsh football club and one of America’s airline companies that advertises on the front of Wrexham’s match shirt. They also shared a new third shirt with special meaning involved
The new Third Shirt
If you remember the last season of the Docu-series of Welcome to Wrexham, the filming crew associated with club owners Rob McElhanney and Ryan Reynolds did a segment on the people of Patagonia in Argentina, that was established by Welsh settlers in the 19th century. Some of those who were interviewed were given a flight to England, and they traveled to Wales to visit their holy land of Wrexham.
Since that episode was produced, no one knew that the club was going to create a special bond to those from Patagonia and the Chubut Region of Argentina as they made special kits depicting the hyroglifics from the people depicting the history of their Welsh ancestors and the Argentines who continue to speak Welsh to this day in the Northern end of the country.
A special video was shown at the Wrexham FC Session at Soccerex where you saw a choir from the cliff of Wales singing and then the cliffs of Patagonia singing back toward Wales. Both choirs removed their frocks to display the new third shirt that has a Sea Blue and White hoops. There is still some red in the shirt around the neck colar, sleeve trims and piping that goes from the colar down the side of the shirt.
“How’s that for a kiy launch, right? That’s amazing. I watched that about 40 times for the last final proof before we published it. I just kept watching it all night long. I was just getting chills every time.” said Michael Williamson, “A fun story about this jersey is about two years ago, probably to the date, Ryan’s team, Maximum Effort, came to us and said, ‘We have this idea.’ There is a small… population in the south of Argentina that left the country of Wales about 200 years ago.
“The community, the language, the culture. We think it would be really cool to shine a spotlight on that, bring some of them back to Wrexham for a match. They’ve never been here. It was a great… You know two to three minutes of organic social content. Let’s go ahead and do it. This will be really amazing. Our team gets down there and starts filming, and we’re hearing from our producers.
This is never going to fit into two to three minutes. There’s just too much good stuff here. So that turns into a 30-minute documentary. That you can watch on YouTube, that turns us bringing those cast members. Cast members, we can cast them if they are human, to Wrexham for St. David’s Day, which is the biggest national holiday in Wales.
They got to participate in a ton of festivities that day, come to the racecourse. We won that day, which was amazing, and then that turned into amazing footage that entered into the docuseries. So welcome to Rex in Season Three, there’s almost a full episode dedicated to that story alone, and then that is what spawned the Jersey.”
The third shirt connects with the Patagonian’s
When they created that episode in the third season of Welcome to Wrexham, the club wanted to connect with those from Patagonia in Argentina and let them know that they mean alot to the club. Which is why the club put so much thought and care into this third shirt. This is why they care about the towne of Wrexham and the connection with those who feel connected from Wales from such a long time ago.
“So we obviously, you know, embrace the Patagonia theme, have a little bit of an Argentinian Patagonia theme here. We have the red dragon for the Patagonia Reds on the back. And then inside on the back of this, we have something that says, ‘Don’t forget where you came from.’ Right? And now I know, grammatically, it should be ‘never forget where you came from.’ But the reason why it’s ‘don’t forget where you came from’ is because that’s also the opening theme song to the Welcome to Rebson documentary. So when you’re able to create something like this— telling a story— people are proud to wear. Not because of just the football club or the badge, but because of what it represents and what it means.” said Williamson
The Wrexham/United Airlines connection
Since the 2023-2024 in the EFL League One, Wrexham has had United Airlines as their shirt sponsor. This partnership has gone very well, but of course there is a slight problem with this sponsorship as there are no airports in the country of Wales. All flights to the U.K. must go towards Heathrow, Gatwick, London inside the central part of the city, Stansted, Luton, and the Southend.
“This is why we’re here, right? It’s not just to explain the partnership of United and Rexham, but to show how important a brand and a club are. When they come together on that vision of community and what they’re trying to portray, can do something like that and then the long-tail version of where that goes.” said Mary Bayne, Director, Strategic Planning & Execution at United Airlines. “I think if any of you followed along, Rob and Ryan had a great time a few years ago when we announced our New Jersey sponsorship that we don’t fly to Wales and we’re like not, unfortunately, going to ever fly to Wales.
“So why would you pick us as front of Jersey? And I think it comes back to the storytelling. It comes back to similar values at a corporate level. We are, first and foremost, it’s all about safety, but our customers and our customer experience is the top priority. Everything we do, every decision we make is taking that into consideration. It’s very similar with what happens with the club and the community.”
The Docuseries is the cause of all this popularity
Without a doubt, the docuseries that Rob & Ryan have created has brought all this attention in multiple ways to the people of Wrexham, the club, and all the popularity it has brought a world wide view of a small town. These two men who have made their money in movies and television shows, brainstormed together on a whim to make this club what they are today in four short years.
It’s more than what happens on the pitch at the Racecourse, it’s more than the promotions in English Football from the National League, to League Two, then to League One and now in the Championship, it’s the excitement of what this club can do during off the pitch and those who want to help tell a story and their association of the country of Wales. Everyone wants to take a chance, like what Rob & Ryan have done.
Soccerex News:
- Soccerex: Legends of the Game Come to Austin USA Vs. Brazil from the 1994 World Cup
- Soccerex 2025 was a fantastic event in Miami Beach
- Soccerex is a great event for the Business side of the Game
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