Activation · Brand campaign · Sport · 2019

Paddy Power × Huddersfield Town

Save Our Shirt.
Unsponsoring football.

The football shirt is supposed to be sacred. Yet in 2019, 59% of UK clubs had a gambling brand on the front. So Paddy Power 'unsponsored' Huddersfield (and four other clubs — after a mischievous launch.

  • Client Paddy Power
  • Year 2019
  • Discipline Activation · PR · Brand campaign
  • Region UK · Global earned
Three Huddersfield Town players in the over-branded Paddy Power kit, the diagonal sash sponsorship that briefly stopped the internet.
The kit. The internet, briefly, lost its mind.
  • 743M
    Earned media impressions
  • 13.2M
    Social engagements
  • 1,905%
    Increase in demand for the Huddersfield shirt
  • +4
    More clubs joined: Motherwell, Newport, Macclesfield, Southend

And the small matter of the UK Sports Minister announcing a review of the Gambling Act, citing the campaign by name.

The brief

The football shirt had become an unregulated media site.

Two million people in the UK were at risk of gambling addiction. The football shirt — a thing supporters care about more than almost any other piece of cultural property — had quietly become a billboard for the industry causing it. By the start of the 2019/20 season, 59% of English clubs had a gambling brand on the front of their kit.

Paddy Power had a problem and an opportunity sitting on top of each other. The brand was loud, culturally fluent, and already in on the joke, but it was also part of the very category fans were complaining about. The brief was simple to phrase and almost impossible to execute: own the start of season by doing something football fans would thank Paddy Power for. Without ever stopping being Paddy Power.

The idea

Sponsor Huddersfield Town. Then take our name off the shirt.

We announced the Huddersfield Town sponsorship on a Monday. By Wednesday we'd released images of a horrendously over-branded kit: a diagonal slash of "PADDYPOWER." running across the front of an otherwise classic blue and white striped jersey. Fans were outraged. Pundits were outraged. The FA called the club. For 48 hours, the football world genuinely believed Paddy Power had ruined the shirt.

Then on Friday, we revealed the actual shirt. Clean. No sponsor. No Paddy Power logo at all. We weren't sponsoring Huddersfield Town. We were unsponsoring them. Paying for the privilege of taking our name off the shirt. And we asked the rest of football to do the same.

The TV ad. The whole story in 30 seconds. Could've just posted this.

The execution

A seven-day plan. Inspired, embarrassingly, by Craig David.

Monday: announce the sponsorship. Play it straight. Wednesday am: release images of the kit. Watch the internet detonate. Wednesday pm: The real kicker. Have Huddersfield walk out in it that afternoon, against Rochdale, in a real pre-season friendly. Friday: reveal the truth. The #SaveOurShirt film. The clean kit. The invitation to the rest of football.

From Wednesday morning to Saturday morning, we trended four times, broke Paddy Power's first-ever Twitter Moment, prompted a hand-wringing, two-page column in the Daily Mail, and were debated live on BBC Breakfast. The Times, the Guardian, Sky Sports News, ITV, Forbes, the FT and just about everyone else followed.

What sold it wasn't the stunt. It was the follow-through. Paddy Power didn't just claim the moral high ground: they paid for it, in public, and kept paying. Four more clubs joined the campaign within a fortnight: Motherwell, Newport County, Macclesfield, and Southend, each unsponsored on the front of the shirt. Everton dropped SportPesa two years ahead of schedule. The story stopped being a stunt and became a movement.

Huddersfield Town players walking out at Rochdale wearing the over-branded kit, watched by a confused crowd.
Wednesday afternoon. Rochdale. They actually wore it.
Huddersfield Town's Aaron Mooy controlling the ball in the over-branded Paddy Power kit during the Rochdale friendly.
Aaron Mooy, mid-game, mid-internet-meltdown.

The result

From the most hated, to the most loved.

BBC Breakfast presenter discussing the Paddy Power Huddersfield shirt with the headline 'Football & Gambling' on screen and the subtitle 'It signalled the death of football'.
BBC Breakfast, July 2019. The kit on the news, the news on the kit.

The campaign provoked the UK Sports Minister to announce a review of the Gambling Act, citing the campaign by name. Four more clubs joined #SaveOurShirt within weeks. The fake shirts — the ones nobody was meant to want — became collectors' items. Demand for the actual Huddersfield shirt rose by 1,905%.

What the press said

  • "From the most hated to the most loved."
    BBC
  • "As a publicity stunt, it worked a dream."
    The Guardian
  • "A statement of faith in the power of earned media."
    Contagious
  • "Paddy Power have the last laugh."
    The Times & Sunday Times
  • "It caused quite the stir on social media."
    Sky News
  • "Hoax Power."
    The Sun
  • "An elaborate stunt."
    Financial Times
  • "Would be nice to see a few clubs follow their lead."
    Forbes

Credits

Campaign lead
Lee Price
PR and social lead
Amy Jones
Partner agency
VCCP
Partner agency
Octagon
Sponsorship agency
CSM
Client
Paddy Power

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