Chelsea Football Club and Mondelēz International, owner of Cadbury, has today announced a global partnership making Cadbury, the UK’s favourite chocolate brand the club’s official chocolate partner.Naturally, Cadbury will be offering Chelsea fans unique access to their club throughout the relationship through a series of activities that fans can look out for over the coming months and seasons. More unusually, the partnership will have a particular focus on connecting with and helping entrepreneurs and small businesses through support of Chelsea Foundation’s Edge of the Box Club, across the 20/21 season and beyond. This unique programme in football circles helps small businesses, start-ups and entrepreneurs kick start their ventures by providing much-needed skills training, knowledge and connections.

Cadbury will initially share its expertise through three bespoke webinars where business owners will be able to learn about brand marketing, sales and strategy insights and analytics, providing a strong foundation in key disciplines crucial to the success of their ventures, particularly against the challenging backdrop of a pandemic. As new and small businesses play a vital role in the economic recovery of the UK, Cadbury is proud to build its collaboration with Chelsea Football Club with this initiative at the heart and play its part in sharing knowledge and experience to help as many companies as possible.What’s more, three lucky webinar attendees will win donated pitch-side perimeter board advertising at the Chelsea Women’s home ground Kingsmeadow during the 20/21 season, gaining an audience of thousands.In coming together in this way, the partnership deal celebrates the similarities and shared values of the two brands - bringing people together, creating and sharing moments of happiness, as well as celebrating and supporting local communities.Chelsea chief executive Guy Laurence said: ‘At Chelsea we pride ourselves on partnering with some of the world's leading companies and are therefore delighted to be announcing our new partnership with Cadbury. We look forward to working closely with Cadbury as they seek to reward and engage our global fanbase, whilst also giving back to the local community through their support of the Chelsea Foundation’s initiatives.’Samantha Greenwood, global brand director at Cadbury added: ‘Start-ups and entrepreneurs are critical to the economic recovery of the country. By partnering with Chelsea FC, who have such a long-standing platform to support small and emerging businesses, we are thrilled to be able to use our privileged position to help developing businesses.’The first fan-focused initiative of the partnership, running across more than 180 million Cadbury products, will be Cadbury’s Match and Win promotion, returning for its fourth and biggest-ever year in late August. Fans will have the chance to win millions of club prizes, including hospitality experiences, match tickets and vouchers redeemable in the Chelsea FC Megastore, as well as Cadbury prizes.Check it out by clicking here for more information

Any entrepreneurs interested in attending the initial Cadbury webinar series for the Chelsea Foundation’s Edge of the Box Club programme, and potentially winning pitch-side advertising for their start-up, can find out more here by clicking hereAnd watch this space for more activities and webinars to be announced as part of the partnership.