Colombia’s ‘half fans’

Now and again a clever PR campaign stops us in our tracks. We’re so impressed by this campaign we wanted to share it. It’s also incredibly timely seeing as England's women play Colombia at the weekend. Have a watch of the video link if you’re short of time or read our blog below.

In 2019, Colombian women’s football was on the brink of collapse, but the men’s game was booming.

The women’s league was set to be cancelled until Aguila beer, the primary sponsor of football in Colombia, ran a visionary PR campaign.

The campaign involved cutting Junior, the Colombian champions’ badge in half, with the men’s team wearing one half and the women’s the other.

Originally fans were outraged, asking ‘what has happened to our beautiful badge?’. However, the campaign eventually gained traction. And just look where the Colombian women’s game is now - a World Cup Quarter Final beckons.

In the weeks after the PR campaign launched, the Colombian women’s league experienced a dramatic increase in support, with a 633% increase in attendances and 55,000 people packing into a stadium for the Colombian League final.

The campaign was first class and shows the power of a simple but effective PR initiative.

The message was simple – half a badge is half a heart. And what good is half a heart? It wasn’t long before other clubs split their badges in two in a symbolic show of support for equality in football. A simple campaign became a movement and that movement has propelled women’s football all the way to the latter stages of the World Cup.

We love the half a badge campaign by Aguila beer. Hopefully the Colombia team celebrate with a few Aguila’s before Saturday’s big match and the Lionesses can march on.