Controversial orange cheering ponchos from Jumbo back in stores
The European Football Championship is coming! This year, we’re (once again) taking part, and we’ll certainly know it. Supermarkets in particular are doing everything they can to make their customers’ orange hearts beat faster. Jumbo is making a striking choice: they’re putting their controversial orange cheering ponchos back on the shelves.
Commercials with (annoying) sing-along jingles, orange snacks, amazing collect-and-save promotions: supermarkets use major football tournaments to attract masses of customers. That’s nothing new. The Wuppies, perhaps one of Albert Heijn’s most popular promotions ever, date back to 2006. How is that possible?! Around the 2022 World Cup, Jumbo also tried to launch a successful football promotion. Unfortunately, the orange cheering ponchos were not a success.
Orange cheering ponchos: not such a smart idea
That had everything to do with the controversial commercial Jumbo released at the time. The cheering poncho—which customers could also use as a bag—was the focus of a short video. In it, rapper Donnie sang and danced with a whole group of construction workers, naturally wearing the cheering ponchos. But it was precisely those construction workers that saw Jumbo miss the mark.
Because, as you may remember, it was widely reported at the time that construction workers in Qatar had to do their jobs in appalling conditions. People even died. The exact number remains rather vague, but in 2022 the organization of the World Cup in Qatar referred to ‘400 to 500’. Bizarre, of course.
Outrage
When Jumbo released the rapper Donnie/construction workers/cheering poncho commercial, it did not go down well with quite a few people. There were especially many outraged reactions on social media. Jumbo then decided to stop broadcasting the commercial as quickly as possible. The supermarket also publicly apologized. So, no cheering ponchos.
A sustainable solution?
Until this year, that is, because in the run-up to the European Championship, Jumbo has nevertheless decided to take them out of the boxes again. Literally: after last time, hundreds of thousands of cheering ponchos were left over. Jumbo sees it as a great and sustainable way to put the ponchos/bags to use after all.
When asked exactly when we can expect the cheering ponchos, the spokesperson remains a little mysterious. The same goes for the European Championship campaign itself, by the way. ‘We’re keeping that secret for now and will announce it soon. But we can already say that it will be beautiful,’ I’m told.
Are you going to get one, the cheering poncho? Or are you secretly waiting for the Wuppie to be brought back to life?
Also read:
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- 10x proof that Action is the champion of weird snacks
- 8x weird products from Jumbo: how do they come up with them?!
Image: Jumbo
