are we paying too much

Replica shirt - are we really paying too much?
Each season new replica kits are released and each season the debate of how much they cost rears it's ugly head. So I thought I'd do a comparison - the major sports in the US/Canada and the major sports here and how much it would cost to buy a replica shirt.

Now to try and make it fair I tried to keep with a simple baseline:
•Mens
•Medium (even if pic shows different size)
•Name and squad number
•League badges (eg EPL on arms)
•This season
•Short sleeve as primary option
One thing in the US/Canada is that they have "replica", where they are copies of the shirts, but of lesser quality fabric, and they have "authentic", which are exact copies. As the replicas we wear are exactly the same as the players will wear on the pitch, for the US I went with "authentic", as this is what their players wear on the pitch/field.

For some of the US sports their kits do not change very much from one season to the next. So cost over time has not been taken into account. This is the one-off cost if you were to go into an official retailer and buy the official shirt.

So for the Spurs home shirt with VDV on the back it is £71



nfl £350
nhl £208
mlb £192
nba £176 no sleeve

mls £57 beckham £82
rugby norhtampton £65
cricket odi england £56
cricket test £45 england
rubgy england £35


So for sports in this country we are paying slightly more. But thank god we don't live in the US/Canada where they pay extortionate prices for their replicas.