SKINS is a sports clothing company run by an Aussie sports-lover who champions “pure sport”. It views its compression-wear (tight-fitting sportswear that forces more blood to your muscles) as legal performance enhancement for all – and directly against doping, cheating and corruption, ie “impure sport”.
It’s also a brand that sees business as being about more than just money. SKINS doesn’t have the finances of Nike or Adidas. The Official Fifa Non-Sponsor campaign (ONS) was put together for less than the price of sponsoring Lionel Messi’s little finger.
To achieve anything meaningful, SKINS has to work with others. The basis for partnership is shared values, which is where SKINS’ commitment to “pure sport” is critical, because these are values that others willingly get behind. The ONS campaign is testament to the power of shared commitment and the brand’s ability to turn commitment into a purposeful movement.
The movement started (Phase I) with family and friends; the launch film features the children of the agency. The impetus for the second phase came about when the company’s chairman, Jaimie Fuller, went to Qatar and met human rights activists who smuggled him into the workers’ camps, where he filmed the footage that evolved into the film. The film’s presenter and scriptwriter, Andrew Jennings – an award-winning journalist who has spent his career investigating Fifa – and activist group #NewFIFANow worked for free.
SKINS shared a press conference to launch the film with the head of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), Damian Collins MP, and campaign director of the TUC. They were joined by NGOs including Transparency International and the
Football Supporters’ Federation, and celebrities and politicians in supporting the cause.
It was the credibility SKINS gained through the ONS campaigning that drove the third phase. Television broadcasters recognised that the brand’s perspective on the Fifa crisis was in the public interest, resulting in Jaimie appearing (at peak) hourly across international rolling news services. Sponsors came to the company because it was clear their interests weren’t simple commercial gain.
This campaign wasn’t “feel good” philanthropy on the side; championing “pure sport” is core to what SKINS is. It means that the brand’s ONS branding is unashamedly prominent throughout and in no way compromises the activity’s integrity.
By putting social purpose at the heart of what SKINS does, the brand is able to draw on the resources of a wider movement to achieve more than what its money alone ever could – and in doing so, reap the high profile benefits of leading positive
social change.
Jason Foo is CEO of BBD Perfect Storm
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