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Kit suppliers
For
many years Saints kits were supplied by local Sports shop, Alexanders, and there were no ‘official’ replica kits
available to fans although they did supply a simple black and white striped shirt instead. Following
promotion to the Premier Division in 1977 Saints turned to multinational company UMBRO and they produced two versions of the
stripes, each being worn for a couple of seasons. In
1981 ADIDAS took over the strip design and also produced two variations which took Saints into 1987 and a switch to Scottish
suppliers Matchwinner and probably the most unpopular strip ever, the ‘Bib’.
They
did redeem themselves with two further strips that resumed the traditional black and white stripes. Following
this Saints turned to Core, and they also produced a strip to challenge for the most unpopular title, with the black and white
‘halves’ strip of 1996-97. Like
Matchwinner they did go onto produce a classic black and white stripe kit that proved a winner. 1996-97
saw Admiral move away from the traditional stripes but still produce a popular strip, with the use of narrow pinstripes on
both home and away versions.
Uhlsport, more noted for goalkeeping
equipment, produced two strips for saints in 97-98 and 98-99 and both were popular, traditional stripes. The away strips however
broke with tradition, being blue (97-98) and Orange (98-99).For 1999-2000 a change was once again made, with Xara producing one of the most popular strips of all time with a
simple striped version. They went on to produce the kits for 8 seasons, making them the clubs longest serving kit manufacturer.
For the start of 2007/08 the club turned to massive Danish sportswear firm Hummel to produce the strip and their debut season produced three versions which were well received by the fans. After four seasons with Hummel, the start of 2011-12 saw another change of supplier and also a change of distributer. After many years of local sport firm Provans being the sole supplier, Saints switched to JD sports as supplier and used JD's own brand of sportswear, Carbrini. The benefits of this deal are much wider retail potential with JD having multiple branches throughout the area and more importantly for the fans, the return to completely striped tops, minus the black or white panels on the back, which had been missing for several seasons.
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A History of St Mirren Football Club
- This is an unofficial website with no direct connection to St Mirren FC |
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