Sponsors will leave FIFA if the leadership doesn't change says one of the Presidential candidates, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein - just as #NewFIFANow would like it
It was interesting to read that Prince Ali bin al-Hussein, who is busy on the FIFA Presidential campaign trail, says that FIFA will struggle to replace sponsors under Sepp Blatter’s continuing leadership.
As is made clear on the #NewFIFANow website, this is a key pressure point and one which #NewFIFANow wrote about to the four Presidential candidates and each of the 209 Member Associations.
Jaimie Fuller of global high-performance sportswear brand, SKINS, also wrote to FIFA’s major partners in January inviting them to the initial meeting of the #NewFIFANow Coalition in Brussels in January. Soon after that meeting, it was reported that three second tier, but high-profile, FIFA sponsors had not renewed their sponsorship.
While none of the three - Castrol, Continental Tyres and Johnson & Johnson - publicly linked their decision not to renew to FIFA’s ongoing mis-governance, their decision would have sparked some alarm in Zurich, especially as it comes on top of previous decisions by Emirates and SONY also not to renew.
Again, neither Emirates nor SONY has linked their decision to FIFA’s scandals publicly. But Emirates’ Head of Sponsorship, Boutros Boutros, came as close as a sponsor might actually do when he made it clear in 2011 that Emirates was “seriously thinking about not renewing” when the agreement expired in 2014 because of FIFA ‘management’ issues.
“Make no mistake: the damage which is being exacted upon ‘Brand FIFA’ has financial implications,” Prince Ali wrote in his election manifesto.
“Sponsors have begun to vote with their feet. If drastic action is not taken urgently to restore the image of our governing body, we can expect revenues to reduce and, in turn, monies available to national associations to also go down.”
Quite.
Expert individuals who have previously become involved with, and tried to support, FIFA ‘from the inside’, such as Judge Guenter Hirsch, Sylvia Schenk, Professor Mark Pieth, Alexandra Wrage and Michael Garcia have all declared that FIFA is incapable of cultural change under its current leadership. (I said the same thing to the Governance Institute of Australia in 2011).
Of the five existing ‘partners’, those who might be considering their options are Coca-Cola and Visa. On the one hand, both companies espouse values of helping to improve lives and workplace rights; but on the other, they give hundreds of millions of dollars to an organisation that funds major tournaments in countries in which – using one example only - there are widespread concerns about the rights of migrant workers.
The remaining three partners include Hyundai-Kia which re-signed with FIFA in the weeks prior to the 2010 World Cup vote through till 2022; Adidas, the company that has long-inspired many FIFA heavyweights including Blatter; and Russia’s global energy giant, Gazprom.
When questioned about the departure of Castrol, Continental Tyres and Johnson & Johnson in January, FIFA indicated it was close to signing new partners for the 2018 World Cup. To date, no announcement has been made. Perhaps this will come in the weeks prior to the May 29th Presidential election because, despite Prince Ali’s claims and the pressure of groups such as #NewFIFANow, suggestions are that FIFA will have no difficulty filling the void.
Marketing experts tend to agree that while many fans and commentators have little respect for the institution of FIFA and its Executive Committee, people still love football – and that’s what they focus on with a global event such as the World Cup. Companies such as Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways are both said to be circling for airline rights, along with other potential category sponsors such as Qatar Petroleum (who is a major partner of the Asian Football Confederation).
However, the more pressure that is put on sponsors (and broadcasters) to take responsibility for putting their money where their corporate values are, the better.
After all, there is an alternative. They can always become an Official Non-Sponsor.
