Feyenoord Women is on the climb: Seeks out greater investment on the back of successful debut-season

Dutch women’s football experienced something big in 2017. That was the year that the women’s national team won its first UEFA title, stirring the masses at home at De Grolsche Veste stadium in the city of Enschede. The Netherlands beat Denmark 4-2 on that summer’s day in August. To the world, the big upset was that their win marked a first since 1993 that a team other than Germany would win in the final. 

But, at home, the win was transformational for the sport. It was perceived as a beacon for women’s football. And its lasting effects can be seen in Feyenoord Vrouwen, which counts the 2021/2022 season as its first. 

The club from Rotterdam plays in the top tier of women’s football, the Vrouwen Eredivisie and has earned the respect of its peers, finishing fifth in its first season. 

Eyes top three slot and bigger resources

The hope now is to gain larger resources and climb to the top three in a matter of years, says Manon Melis, Manager of Football. 

Melis has skin in the game: she’s a former high-profile footballer and had been vocal during her playing career about the importance of the national team doing well to help support the development of Dutch women's football. Not just to boost the competitive landscape, but to aid in sponsorship and investment as well. Continuing to work in the field is her way of giving back—and playing her part in ensuring that women’s football continues on an upward trajectory at Feyenoord and beyond.

Melis was appointed in her role in 2017—the national team win proving her right. But, launching a team was not the first goal. Feyenoord has taken a painstaking approach, first focusing on youth players and building its academy from which to home grow much of its team. As it stands today, of the 22 players on its roster, eight players have come through the academy. 

It can be rare that things work out as planned, but so far, that’s been the case for Feyenoord. Melis notes that the club was on a five-year plan to begin professional play, and actually hit its mark 4-5 years in. 

“It was a good plan—we succeeded,” says Melis. “It was hard with finance because of COVID—the club lost a lot of money, but still thought it was important to start—and it was the right time to start.”

“You can grow not only as a club, but as a city”

With the academy already in place, Melis says part of the goal is to showcase its homegrown talent and demonstrate to The Netherlands “that you can grow not only as a club, but as a city that loves the sport and prove that a club can truly develop with an academy through the success of the first team,” she says.

The women’s team is counterpart to Feyenoord Rotterdam, the men’s club, which enjoys a long and celebrated history. With origins that date back to 1908, the club is one of the most popular and successful Dutch clubs to play in the top tier league, the Eredivisie. 

Persevering through financial distress, which nearly brought the club to bankruptcy in 2010, that same year a group of investors known as the Vrienden van Feyenoord (friends of Feyenoord) absorbed its debt and paid 49 percent of shares of the club. 

Like all sports, Feyenoord recorded a loss during the pandemic. A 2020/2021 annual report detailed the €17 million loss, attributing €4 million to operating loss and a €13 million deficit in its transfer market dealings.

Despite this, the women’s club came into force this season. While Melis was unable to disclose revenue, to begin with, she says the club was given a budget of €400,000. But, from the beginning, working with what it had translated into something much bigger. 

With cross-leverage capabilities, this has struck the right cord. On the sponsorship front, both sides enjoy the same support. Feyenoord’s main sponsor is Euro Parcs, a provider of high-end holiday parks across Europe (think glamping tents and luxury villas). Adidas and Heineken are among the club’s various strategic partners. 

Landing its first dedicated sponsor

Melis says that Euro Parcs Group serves as main sponsor for both the men’s and the women’s first team. The one distinct difference is in the training kits, which is separate for the women’s team. Last October, the team landed a dedicated sponsor, Van Donge & de Roo, which provides logistics services in The Netherlands.
“That money is for the girls and not the whole club,” she says. “It’s a good thing for the women’s club.” That deal is set for two years.

Sponsors play a critical role, of course, for every club. For a new team just starting out, Feyenoord has bartering deals in place, which helps to offset its stringent budget. 

So for instance, hotel stays and food costs are free due to sponsor agreements, wiping away any headaches of travel when playing outside of home territory. 

That said, Melis hopes for a significantly bigger budget for next season, partly to help its roster of players become fully professional players. In the future, while the club continues to develop on and off the pitch, Feyenoord would also like to have enough of a budget to attract foreign players, such as from the U.S. and the U.K. 

“What’s most important now is to develop the Dutch competition and our own talented young players,” says Melis. 

At present, all players for Feyenoord are Dutch nationals, with one who is half-Tunisian and also plays for the Tunisian national team. Several team members are university students, but roughly 40 percent work outside jobs, such as physiotherapy. And a handful actually work for Feyenoord Foundation, within the schools and neighborhoods, providing football training. Others serve as coaches to the youth players. 

This is a point of pride for Melis, who wants more examples of women coaches for girls to grow up with as well as more role models. 

When Melis was growing up, she couldn’t play in her home city because there was no viable way for that to happen. She grew up always supporting the men, which was natural, too, as her father, Harry Melis, was also a professional footballer, and she said from a young age that she wanted to follow the same path. Still, she desired something tangible for herself, something to look towards, when it came to girls and the world’s game. 

Melis’s career began in The Netherlands in 1993 when she was seven where she played for RVVH until she was 19, subsequently landing a place on The Netherlands national team. Melis went abroad, playing for a few Swedish clubs, including Kopparbergs/Goteberg FC and for Seattle Reign FC in the U.S. Melis retired in 2016. She had long been calling for a women’s team to play on at Feyenoord, desiring to play for her home city. 

While it happened after she left the pitch, in the short time that Feyenoord’s women’s team has been in existence, Melis has witnessed an interesting shift in demographics. It’s no longer men and boys attending games, but families, including grandparents, that are sitting in the stands to cheer the women on, she says. Women players are now household names in Dutch football. 

“I’m super proud to see we are so accepted,” says Melis. “People like it, even the coaches from the [men’s] academy come to the games. 

Part of that acceptance is a direct result of social media, and media platforms in general, giving fans and potential fans access to games and other forms of content—a point well-documented now. For its part, Feyenoord created a documentary, “No Matter What”, which was released on YouTube earlier this year, giving insight into how people in and around the squad experienced the club’s historic debut season.

The goal: getting on par with clubs like Man City and Chelsea

Elsewhere on the acceptance front, the 2022 UEFA women’s final on 31 July resulted in the largest crowd ever to attend a women’s Euros tournament, drawing in 87,192 spectators. The 2017 final had 240,055 people in attendance. 

The results of the 2022 final seeing England record its first win may see some shades of similarity for The Netherlands. England bested Germany also on its home turf at Wembley Stadium 2-1.

Directionally, as Melis puts it, the hope is the club will eventually be given more financial resources on par with other clubs, citing the likes of Chelsea FC and Manchester City, as good benchmarks.

“To succeed, we need more investment—more finance,” she says. “England winning is a big example. It costs money—good coaching, youth programs, strength and conditioning. All of these areas require these resources if we are to achieve our goals.”