West Ham’s potential stadium sponsorship deal with UK supermarket chain Tesco has been roundly greeted with chuckles and chortles online today.
There is no financial detail doing the rounds, but for this rumour to broach the public domain, one would presume that we are talking about a considerable amount of money.
Just how funny is this, though?
We’ve joked mercilessly on here about everything from the Chick King Meal Dealodrome to the Anusol Arena but as we have learned from shirt sponsorship deals, we poor schmucks have zero control over the brands or the colour palettes employed.
At time of writing we have not been linked with anyone than Nike – which would be an insanely good fit – but the suggestion from Gladys was that the boy Levy was too interested in carving up the sponsorship pie into as many pieces as possible in order maximise profit.
Beyond Nike, we’ve been aware of a THFC brochure campaign targeting blue chip businesses in London, such as Shell.
The best we can hope for is a brand that is as unobtrusive as possible when it comes to the piss-taking stakes.
In many respects, this is like naming a child. Beyond the vanity project side of things such as how statesmanlike will the boy appear, how confident and wise will your daughter’s name sound – the bottom line is always what awful abuse might the name provoke by the mean spirited types that walk this earth?
If this Tesco thing pans out, then the Clubcard, ‘unexpected item in bagging area’ and ‘reduced to clear’ gags will be never ending.
When West Ham are dominating a game and passing to each other with ease, instead of cries of ‘ole!’ a chorus of high pitched beeeeeps might be in order.
As I’ve said previously, I can only see West Ham going from strength to strength in their new home. It’s probably one of the most intelligent bits of football business I’ve witnessed in my lifetime.
Morons will mope and moan about the whole thing being horribly corrupt and subsidised by the state, but like most morons, this simply displays a fundamental lack of understanding.
The 2012 Olympics was a gush fest for the middle classes, and that’s all it was.
Funding for most sports has since been cut or ceased altogether and the grim reality is that West Ham are actually sparing the government’s blushes by agreeing to be an anchor tenant in what was otherwise a gigantically expensive and largely prefabricated white elephant.
I loathe West Ham, but they’ve got a business model on the go that only a fool would refuse to admire.
