At the 2014 World Cup, a new spray made its appearance on the football pitch: the so-called Vanishingspray that keeps players and the ball in place during free kicks. The Limburg-based Expo-Line would have been a supplier. Now the company is competing to become an official supplier for the 2018 World Cup in Russia.
Expo-Line is a Belgian manufacturer and supplier of line marking paint and line marking machines and the company behind the voetbalmateriaal.com website. This company, based in Tessenderlo, stocks every kind of football equipment from whistles and balls, through marking trolleys and goals, to stands and players’ tunnels.
The football materials go mainly to the Belgian and Dutch markets. ‘In Belgium we have an 80% market share, in the Netherlands it is around 30-40%,’ Raf Bogaerts says. ‘We are now quietly starting to export these materials in France and Germany as well. But with the line marking paints, our company is also active in other European countries.’
OFFICIAL SUPPLIER UEFA
The development of the innovative Vanishingspray puts Expo-Line further on the football map. An easily exportable product with which Expo-Line aims to go global.
‘The negotiations with Brazil were almost complete for the World Cup 2014, but unfortunately we dropped out at the last minute. In the meantime, we have been appointed official supplier to UEFA and are now also aiming at the World Cup in three years’ time in Russia. Meanwhile, we are in an advanced negotiation phase there. It did surprise me that Russia – despite its anti-European stance – still opened the gate.’
