PANTS OFF IN ANTI-AMBUSH MARKETING FRENZY

Pants off in anti-ambush marketing frenzy

The IPKat reads with incredulity that miserable megalomaniac moneygrabbing sports admininstrators FIFA ordered hundreds of Dutch fans to take off their trousers before entering the stadium for their country's World Cup match against Ivory Coast on Friday. The fans were wearing dungarees in the Dutch team's orange colour, but bearing the logo of a Dutch beer company that was not one of the World Cup official sponsors. Said FIFA:

"Anyone can wear whatever they want, but if a company tries to carry out ambush marketing, FIFA must prevent that happening. In common with the IOC (International Olympic Committee) and UEFA, we do not tell individual supporters what to wear, but ... FIFA has already won a court case against a beer manufacturer who tried this sort of thing".

What this means is

"Anyone can wear whatever they want, if FIFA says so".

American beer Budweiser and Germany's Bitburger are thus the only beers that can be sold, or even worn by spectators, in the 12 World Cup stadiums.

The IPKat wonders what FIFA would have done, had the offending garments been t-shirts worn by thousands of young ladies.

Says Merpel, for those of us who are saturated with Budweiser's mass marketing and fancy a refreshing change, the Dutch brewer's imaginative ploy is most welcome. For the record, most media - presumably because they benefit handsomely from Budweiser's vast advertising budget - coyly refuse to tell us the identity of this Dutch upstart. The company is called Bavaria NV (thanks, localnewswatch.com, for that information) and anyone who supports the principle of competition should buy its ales.