In the lead up to the World Cup semi final clash between Germany and Brazil, European retailer Media Markt has sent it street teams out across the host nation on a mission to modify the Brazilian flag to German national colours on stickers and posters across the country.
This Germanification is part of the German electronics retailer’s ongoing ambush campaign ‘Schlandification’ (as in ‘Deutschlandification’) – a mission to convert the world’s football fans into supporters of the German national side.
This is the latest strand of the retailer’s guerrilla Brazil 2014 initiative, developed with Ogilvy & Mather Germany, aims to grow the German fanbase around the world by converting football fans of other nations across the world into supporters of German’s squad.
The on-the-ground phase is amplified around the campaign’s core Tumblr site and through its own social channels (including its Facebook page).
Built around the idea that Media Markt wants the entire world to support the German team, the activity’s aim is to convert all fans into supporters of Germany (in a charming way of course).
Previous episodes came on 23 June when the Media Markt marketers modify the Mexican flag for the Mexico v Croatia match which saw the two sides compete for a place in the tournament’s last 16..
The campaign was initially launched with an innovative stunt set in an Italian Laundromat where locals were invited to do their washing for free if they brought an Italian shirt in as part of the laundry load.
Yet, those Italian football fans who took up the offer were shocked at the results which saw rigged washing machines swap their azure blue Italian shirts for white German kits when the wash was finished.
Other elements of the campaign include a set of Media Markt World Cup World Cup accessories for fan and Brazil 2014 parties – all in the German national black, red and gold colour combination (including a brackets-style fixture wall chart with the flags of all the competing nations rebranded in the German colours).
Comment
The England manager’s position has long been described as ‘The Impossible Job’, but this Media Markt campaign has surely bitten off an even tougher task in converting the world’s football fans into German supporters.
And surely the tongue-in-cheek objective to turn the heads of host nation Brazilians is, despite what adidas might say, impossible.
Still, it appears the Germans are having fun giving it a go.
Links
Schlandification Tumblr
http://schlandification.tumblr.com/
Media Markt Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/mediamarkt
Media Markt YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/user/MediaMarktDE
Media Markt Twitter
