Christopher Ward is furthering its presence in the soccer world with a new partnership.
The English-Swiss watch company was revealed on Tuesday as the official timing partner for Men in Blazers Media Network, the North American soccer-focused digital media company.
The partnership came together through Men in Blazers’ founder and chief executive officer Roger Bennett and Christopher Ward’s founder and CEO Mike France’s shared love and lifelong fandom of the Everton Football Club. The watch brand has also been the official timing partner for Everton since 2022 and the women’s back-of-shirt sponsor, as well as a founding partner of the club’s forthcoming new stadium.
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“Christopher Ward is about to attack the American market with a joy and ferocity, and Everton wants to tell their story at the same time to the American market,” Bennett said. “The American fanbase, it’s like what space was to Captain Kirk — it’s the final frontier — and every team, the biggest teams in the world, want to win the American hearts and minds, so this really is a three-way relationship. Men in Blazers Media Network, we own football fandom in the U.S. We have a very diverse audience. We speak to 20- to 30-year-old football fans of the Premier League. We have a women’s platform for the women’s games, which is surging. We have a Hispanic-facing platform, so Everton wanted to speak to that and Christopher Ward wanted to speak to that.”
To kick off the partnership, Christopher Ward is debuting the Goodison watch, which is a limited-edition style that pays homage to Everton’s Goodison Stadium, the historic institution dating back to 1892, which is being demolished later this year.
Christopher Ward's Goodison watch
Christopher Ward’s Goodison watch. Courtesy of Christopher Ward
“Goodison Park, which has been around since 1892 and was actually the first stadium specifically designed for football in the world, it’s now in its 133rd year,” France said. “For Evertonians, it resonates really emotionally. You’ve got similar stadiums in the U.S., particularly associated with baseball which the fanbase has an emotional connection, but it’s an old stadium. The new world requires much more modern facilities. But because of the connection of the fans of Goodison Park to Everton fans, it seemed natural to us that we would design a watch that celebrated the history of the ‘grand old lady,’ as it’s called.”
The watch takes inspiration from the stadium in a multitude of ways. The timepiece is designed in a royal blue hue, giving a nod to Everton’s signature color, and is crafted with a crisscross motif reminiscent of the way the stadium’s stands were designed. The brand also took inspiration from the historic clocks that previously stood in the stadium, mimicking the design of the clock’s hands for the watch.
Most notably, Christopher Ward was able to utilize metal from the actual Goodison Park turnstiles to melt down into coins to use on the back of the watch. The coins were then stamped with an image of Goodison Park.
“The real joy for an Evertonian is you’ve literally got a piece of history on your wrist and a piece of history that’s very emotional if you’re an Evertonian,” France said. “It’s a very evocative watch.”
To further the homage, 1,892 units of the timepiece are being produced as a nod to the year the stadium was built.
France explained that the first 100 customers will receive the watch with an additional watch strap crafted from Everton game-worn jerseys from the 2024-25 season. Other customers will also receive a strap crafted from an authentic Everton team shirt.
Christopher Ward's Goodison watch
Christopher Ward’s Goodison watch. Courtesy of Christopher Ward
“The stadium is a physical place and a grand old home, but it’s also for millions of people who have been there, it’s a place of collective memories,” Bennett said. “Some of my joyous memories — the most challenging and the most profound. That’s what sports do, they forge collective memory, so looking down on this watch, ultimately it’s to carry a piece of the stadium on my person and to look down and feel a sense of those memories in the most joyous and uplifting fashion.”
Christopher Ward’s Goodison watch is available for pre-order on March 19, with deliveries said to go out in April. The watch is priced at 595 pounds (roughly $765) with a leather strap and 750 pounds (roughly $965) with a metal strap. As part of the brand’s “2% for Good” initiative, Christopher Ward is donating 2 percent of sales to the Everton in the Community program, which is the football club’s long-standing charity giving back to the county of Merseyside.
“Everton and Christopher Ward have an interesting similarity and ethos,” France said. “They are an elite football club, but they’re not in any way elitist. That’s exactly our positioning in the market. We’re an elite watch brand, but we’re not elitist in anything we do. We want the visceral pleasure of a fine watch available to as many people as possible, so that’s the model we started with 20 years ago and that’s still the model today.”
In addition to the Goodison watch, Christopher Ward’s partnership with Men in Blazers includes exclusive digital content and fan experiences meant to increase excitement leading into next year’s Men’s World Cup.