To our loyal supporters,

I am blessed to be coming to you as the head of Scratch Rock Records, and it saddens me greatly to have the responsibility of delivering such disappointing news.

Upon our company’s rebranding in 2019, we were presented with a fantastic and exciting opportunity in the form of a sponsorship proposition with the North London ice hockey team: the Haringey Huskies. Many of us here at Scratch Rock Records are big fans of the sport, and had been attending Huskies’ matches as fans and admirers the previous season. Naturally, we felt incredibly fortunate to be welcomed into their family of sponsors.

Over the subsequent twenty-four months we were thrilled to be a part of such a wonderful community. Whether it was at the games, at the local watering hole, or online, we were subject to the warmth of the Haringey Huskies fans and players and for that we will forever be grateful.

Entering into the covid-19 lockdowns, we were faced with the hardships that we are, unfortunately, all too familiar with. As many of you will know the entertainment industry, sports and music alike, were hardest hit by lockdowns and restrictions placed upon all of our lives.

Having had such a fantastic first season as a Haringey Huskies sponsor, we at Scratch Rock Records were very keen to partner once more with the Huskies, as two local businesses, in order to help each other through the pandemic. With the future looking bleak in the music industry during 2020, we were naturally thrilled to receive a proposition from the owner of the Haringey Huskies that would safeguard both parties in the event of a season played behind closed doors. As an independent record label, we were heavily reliant on having people in seats at the Haringey Huskies home games, there to support the team and be exposed to our artists’ music during the intermissions of play. Without you wonderful fans there, however, our financial backing of the Huskies would not have been possible without some sort of provisional clause for future relations between us and the club. This is why it filled us with great confidence that the Haringey Huskies appeared to be ready to support us like we were supporting them. To put it more plainly: we were willing to financially assist the club through covid pandemics during the 2020/2021 season, and in return we would be greeted with very favourable conditions upon a renewal of the sponsorship agreement for the following season.

Alas, had all gone as promised, I would not be sat here today writing this statement. Whilst it would be fruitless and tasteless to air dirty laundry out for the world to see it is our responsibility, both to our unwavering supporters and to the general public, to be completely transparent with all of you about what, unfortunately, turned out to be a very disappointing turn of events.

Firstly, during the unprecedented and disrupted 2020/2021 season the Huskies failed to honour certain pledges to us: an example of this was that none of our artists’ music was played during the games played behind closed doors, even though the games were streamed online, despite that being an agreed condition of our sponsoring of the team for that season.

Additionally upon entering negotiations with the team’s owner for the following season, for which we were promised those favourable conditions having financially supported the team through the covid season, we were met with nothing but hostility and dismissal, much to our immense disappointment. Having had such a positive experience with the team’s owner in the past, it was naturally sorrowful for us to be subjected to such malice.

The negotiations deteriorated, despite our best efforts to maintain good relations, and neither side could come to an agreement for the 2021/2022 season. From our perspective, the actions of the Haringey Huskies owner could be summed up as having taken our money the previous year, disregarded his promises which had been signed into a legally binding contract, and justified his choice by unsolicitedly placing our logo at the bottom of the Huskies’ jerseys. Needless to say, as far as we are concerned he took the money which we had placed in order to financially help the club through covid lockdowns, broke his promises, and disregarded us as loyal supporters of your wonderful community.

We were advised to take legal action against the club, and whilst financially that may have been the right decision for us to make we were not prepared to let the actions of one man affect the fantastic people behind the scenes at the club, the wonderful and resilient players on the ice, and certainly not the incredible fanbase that the club has been fostering over the last few years. It is merely the choices of one man, and his decision to throw us by the wayside as soon as he felt he had got as much use out of us as he could without honouring his side of a partnership.

As a result, Scratch Rock has and will be distancing itself from all associations with the club.

Moving forward we do genuinely hope that the club, its players, and its fans have a bright future ahead, and we hope that many will get to experience the warmth of the community that revolves around it. We are not here to try and dissuade you from following the team, and we are not here to try and bring the club into disrepute. But having had many of our fans and followers ask us repeatedly what our future held when it came to our involvement with the club, we felt it important to be as honest as possible, and to bring light to a set of actions that we felt had been unjust.

In order to try and avoid this situation turning into a nasty back and forth over the internet and social media, this will most likely be the only time that we at Scratch Rock will comment on the matter.

Thank you, as ever, for the unwavering support that you have always shown us and our artists. Without people like you, our organisation could not exist.

Thank you for taking the time to read this statement, and stay safe out there.

At your service, always,

Minky Très-vain, CEO of Scratch Rock LTD.