Kansas City Royals will wear this QuikTrip jersey patch as part of new partnership
The Kansas City Royals’ uniforms will look a little different this season. On Wednesday, the Royals announced a partnership with QuikTrip to become their official jersey patch partner for the 2024 campaign.
The Royals will debut the new jersey patch in Friday’s spring training opener against the Texas Rangers at Surprise Stadium in Surprise, Arizona.
The partnership is also among the first of its kind in Major League Baseball. Both the Royals and QuikTrip are coming together to feature a jersey patch that is centered around an investment in literacy and the community.
“The Royals legacy, whether it’s been Ewing Kauffman to the John Sherman ownership group, has been deeply committed to education on and off the field,” Royals executive vice president and chief commercial and community impact officer Sarah Tourville said. “Where we found a really strong alignment with QuikTrip was in education.”
This season, the Royals will launch a special activation called “Hit the Books.” The program is geared toward improving literacy rates among Kansas City youth. Their research shows that 21% of third-grade students in the KC public school district and charter schools are reading at grade level, per a Royals news release.
Students that can’t read proficiently by the third grade are four times less likely to graduate high school. Both the Royals and QuikTrip are hoping to change those numbers.
“We feel like if you can empower a kid, regardless of their zip code they were born into, (we can) stimulate them with the right educational resources,” Tourville said.
The “Hit the Books” program will include several factors, including a donation for every Royals hit this season. The specific donation amount has not been announced. However, the Royals and QuikTrip are excited to continue fostering literacy programs.
“In our first conversation, we told the Royals’ team, ‘We have billboards on every corner and every highway, so Kansas City already knows about QT,’” QuikTrip community relations manager Lauren Sherry said. “‘But what if we could work together and use our platforms to do something that helped people?’ We are excited to see the increased impact of this unique partnership unfold over the next several years.”
Each Royals jersey will feature the QuikTrip patch this season. In 2023, Major League Baseball allowed teams to have specific partnerships on their uniforms. Several teams have jersey patches that highlight a unique sponsor.
The Royals considered local partners in the Kansas City area. However, they chose QuikTrip as the company to help round out their brand and uniforms.
QuikTrip, which was founded in 1958 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, has relationships with other Royals’ partners such as Price Chopper. The Royals view QuikTrip’s reach as a way to introduce the team brand to other areas nationwide.
“You think of the Royals footprint, it’s pretty significant from a TV viewing perspective,” Tourville said. “It’s Missouri, it’s Kansas, it’s Oklahoma and extending beyond. We love that opportunity because it extends our fan reach.”
The Royals begin the 2024 regular season against the Minnesota Twins on March 28 at Kauffman Stadium.
