@maxxrosenblum
Instagram · Greenscreen Talking Head
@maxxrosenblum Everyone is asking why FIFA covered brand logos with tarps and tape this summer. The better question is why the cover-ups outperformed the sponsors. When I dug into the research, a pattern emerged: consumers largely cannot tell who paid. At Euro 2024, Nike was named an official sponsor almost as often as Adidas, the brand actually writing the check. Sponsor identification, it turns out, isn’t memory. It’s a guess about who plausibly would have paid, and the guess always favors the biggest name in the category. That changed how I think about sponsorship. The badge is only the entry fee: sponsors spend another $1.90 per rights-fee dollar activating the deal, partly to defend against brands that paid nothing. Meanwhile, the winners of this World Cup needed just two capabilities, and only one of them takes years to build. A mark famous enough to be recognized under a tarp. And an organization that lets the team closest to the moment ship before it passes. The first is a decade of consistency. The second is a decision most companies could make on Monday. #economics #fifaworldcup2026 #branding #marketing #soccer
