Successful Suffolk logistics company Magnus Group is proud to be sponsoring the iconic Ipswich Town Football Club’s West stand.
The new Magnus Group West Stand will be unveiled at the home match with AFC Wimbledon tomorrow. The name will soon become familiar to fans, just as it did for previous sponsors like Pioneer, Britannia, and the East of England Co-op.
Magnus Group CEO Olly Magnus, a die-hard Ipswich fan, says the sponsorship deal reflects an incredible two years of growth for the family business. Olly was a partner in another logistics company when his father, Paul Magnus, died in 2018. He then sold up and invested his money into Magnus Group, becoming the majority shareholder in 2019.
“It’s been quite the ride since,” said Olly. “I put everything into the company, but thanks to the amazing teams we now have at our Great Blakenham HQ and at our new warehousing and offices in Felixstowe, we have turned the business around and are poised for further significant growth. Like being out on the pitch, it’s all about teamwork and doing things the right way.”
Magnus Group provides 355,000 sq ft of warehousing space, local distribution, road haulage and global freight-forwarding services and has increased turnover by 170% in 18 months, with staff rising from 103 to 160.
Olly has always been keen to place Magnus Group at the centre of the community. The business already sponsors the ITFC under 16s team shirts, amateur racing driver Mark Steel, and other sports and charity groups. But the new Magnus Group West Stand deal is the icing on the cake.
“I couldn’t be prouder to see our name up there on the West Stand,” explained Olly. “It’s not just any stand, either; it’s where I stood for my first game, aged 6, with my sister Emma and my late father back in 1979. I don’t remember much about the match, but I do remember falling off my stool. All the kids stood on stools or milk crates in those days!
“When the new stand, then called the Pioneer, was built a few years later, my father, grandfather and I had season tickets in the upper tier for six or seven years.”
Olly was too young to remember the epic FA Cup victory against Arsenal in 1978, but he does recall watching Sir Bobby Robson’s famous team become the most feared in Europe, lifting the UEFA Cup in 1981.
Like all other club supporters and local businesses, Olly has been impressed with how the new ITFC ownership team has hit the ground running at Portman Road.
He said: “There is a certain synergy. Magnus Group is a local company, operating nationally, and like Ipswich Town, we want success. But we want to do it the right way.”
Ipswich Town’s director of Sales Rosie Richardson said: “We are extremely delighted to announce that Magnus Group are the new sponsors of the West Stand. The agreement spans a minimum of two years. Magnus Group are a locally based company and they have shown their support of the Club through various initiatives and this sponsorship agreement now further cements this.”
Rosie added: ‘’The West Stand has had significant and memorable sponsors over years gone by and the association with Magnus Group will be just as iconic.’’
