Interesting Branding.
Argentina Futbol Celestial
Last summer, to coincide with the World Cup, mad.co.uk ran a competition, asking six agencies to rebrand one of the competing teams to turn them into an unmissable sponsorship opportunity for the imaginary Japanese mobile telephony giant, Watatak.
We pulled a slightly short straw and got Argentina. We rose to the challenge however and had a lot of fun with the campaign we came up with. We finished as respectable runners-up, behind Brazil, but then everyone always prefers a samba to a tango, don't they?
Ask any football connoisseur outside Argentina what characterises the beautiful game in the great South American republic and the answer is likely to be less than complimentary. Cheating, he’ll say, diving, hair perming, shirt pulling, more cheating, sly fouling, hair pomading, dodgy tackling and yet more cheating.
This initial outburst off our connoisseur’s chest,
he grudgingly starts to use words like technique, pace, skill. Pushed further, he might start to mention passion, vision, daring and expertise, albeit through gritted teeth. Finally, even if the connoisseur is English or worse, Brazilian, he will launch, despite himself into superlatives. “Alright, they play wonderful football”, he’ll say. “When they get it right, it’s heavenly.”
he grudgingly starts to use words like technique, pace, skill. Pushed further, he might start to mention passion, vision, daring and expertise, albeit through gritted teeth. Finally, even if the connoisseur is English or worse, Brazilian, he will launch, despite himself into superlatives. “Alright, they play wonderful football”, he’ll say. “When they get it right, it’s heavenly.”
There couldn’t be a better adjective to describe Argentina’s game. It is truly inspirational, and as the English know to their cost, more than occasionally assisted by divine intervention. The heavenly link goes further. The blue in their famous stripy strip is called celeste in Spanish. Because of this, the national team’s nickname is los albicelestes. The nation’s symbol is the sun. How many more connections with on high do you need? Argentina is the only nation on earth that can claim to be the real home of heavenly football.
We have given the team a new brand identity based on this idea. Firstly,we have changed the official name of the club. The Asociación de Fútbol Argentina is no more. The new brand name – Argentina, Fútbol Celestial – focuses much more overtly on the team and links it to a clear, simple statement about what makes Argentine football unique in the world.
