PKF partners with the Newcastle Knights for 2023 NRL season
Citing a joint community focus, accounting and consulting firm PKF has signed on as a partner of the Newcastle Knights rugby league men’s team for the 2023 NRL season.
The Sydney and Newcastle branch of professional services firm PKF has partnered with the Newcastle Knights for the 2023 NRL season, which kicked off at the beginning of the month. Both organisations cited a lengthy association with the region and mutual commitment to the local community as a driving force behind the partnership, with PKF also supporting grassroots rugby union across the region.
“We are proud to be partnering with the Knights for the 2023 season,” said PKF Sydney and Newcastle managing director Bob Bell, who took over the top job in March of last year.
“Our connection to Newcastle goes back to 1977 and this partnership is a representation of our ongoing commitment to the local community and Hunter region. We wish the Knights all the very best for the season ahead.”
Founded as Lawler Partners in Newcastle in 1977, the firm later merged with PKF to form one of Australia’s top ten accounting and consulting networks, while the Knights entered the top flight in their current guise in 1988, the team’s last premiership coming in 2001. Newcastle is hoping to bounce back from a lean 2022 season, having finished bottom three, although its women’s team took home the cup.
“As a club, we can learn a lot from the approach taken by PKF over the long term,” said Knights CEO Philip Gardner. “We have a deep and enduring connection to our community and we exist to give back to the people who give to us, and that is exactly what PKF does in business and in life. “I thank the entire PKF team for the trust and endorsement that is inherent in linking their brand to ours.”
The new sponsorship sees PKF extend its portfolio of community partners, which includes support for the local Merewether Carlton Rugby Union Club and Hunter Rugby Union in general, as well as the annual Breast Care Breakfast for Hunter Nurses event for which it has raised over $250,000 since 2006. The firm is also the auditor for and enthusiastic participants of Dry July in support of cancer patients.
“The Newcastle Knights are so much more than a rugby league team, they reach and inspire the whole Newcastle region,” said PKF partner Andrew Beattie. “Our firm has been proud to be connected to the Knights in one way or another since their inception, and we are proud that our two brands will be shoulder-to-shoulder once again and giving back to this wonderful, loyal and passionate Newcastle community.”
