New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is one of the most-watched NFL players in the biz, particularly by folks who don’t care for the game. Being married to supermodel Gisele Bundchen will do that for a guy.
So it set tongues wagging Wednesday when Brady showed up at his weekly Wednesday press conference wearing a gray sweatshirt that had the Nike logo that is usually there on the sleeve covered up with a little piece of white tape. Nike, of course, is the official supplier of the NFL’s apparel. But, as NESN points out, Brady has a deal with competitor Under Armour.
Brady talked about plenty of things, such as his ailing right shoulder and the team’s 1-2 record. But he didn’t address how that piece of perfectly sized tape happened to get onto his sweatshirt right at that particular spot.
The Boston Globe's New England Patriots beat reporter, Shalise Manza Young, tweeted the photo above and later commented, "Brady has vested interest in UA - not just spokesman, gets share of profits."
Perhaps he took inspiration from rookie Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III, who has a deal with Adidas and much more blatantly covered up the Nike logo on his warm-up shirt before the season got underway by spelling out the word “heart” with tape.
One thing Brady (and Bundchen) feel good about promoting, though, is a Massachusetts candy company, Unreal, that attempts to take all the junk out of the junk food. Brady has appeared in two promotional videos for the company in the last few months.
While Nike isn’t happy about its logo disappearing from the clothing of NFL stars, the company has decided on its own to remove the logo from a different sporting arena: the U.S. Open of Surfing. According to Transworld Sports, Nike and its Hurley division have both decided after four years to no longer sponsor the event.
“So much magic happened during our time at the US Open and we’re confident that magic will continue,” Hurley SVP of Marketing Evan Slater told Transworld. “But we also strive to constantly innovate and evolve. For us, we’ve decided to export what we created at the US Open and invest it into other aspects of our business, like a renewed athlete focus and new and exciting ways of connecting with millions of kids.”
Slater wouldn’t get more specific than that, but it didn’t sound like the plan was to move those marketing dollars to another event but instead to the world of social and Internet marketing. After all, what says surfing more than a Facebook page?
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