November 6 – Leading FIFA sponsors Adidas have broken their silence over the ongoing corruption scandal by insisting the crisis has not adversely affected its brand.
Whilst four of FIFA’s front-line commercial partners have urged Sepp Blatter to step down and continue to call for meaningful reform, Adidas has taken somewhat of a backseat but its chief executive says its image has not been harmed.
“The image for our products have never been better so I am definitely convinced that the consumers clearly differentiates between us as a company and the brand and what’s going on in FIFA,” Herbert Hainer told a conference call.
Adidas has provided the World Cup match ball since 1970 and extended its partnership with FIFA until 2030 two years ago.
The German company faced criticism last month after declining to join other major sponsors in stepping up the pressure on FIFA and Blatter who is currently suspended him for 90 days along with UEFA president Michel Platini, previously considered the favourite to take over from the veteran Swiss at February’s election.
Hainer stressed Adidas had called for FIFA reform even before last year’s World Cup in Brazil and said the company was in “constant dialogue” with FIFA and its ethics committee.
Hainer also stressed Adidas was not in any way involved with the growing slush fund scandal in Germany. Police and tax investigators raided the headquarters of the DFB on Tuesday to investigate suspected tax evasion linked to the hosting of the 2006 World Cup.
At the heart of the investigation is a €6.7 million payment from the DFB to FIFA that Der Spiegel magazine claims was a return on a loan from the then Adidas CEO Robert Louis-Dreyfus to help buy votes for Germany’s World Cup bid in 2000.
“This doesn’t have anything to do with Adidas as Dreyfus gave money when he had already left the company. It was his private money,” Hainer told reporters.
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