http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=711610
The Green Bay Packers didn't win the NFC championship last Sunday, but impoverished Mongolians could soon be sporting green and gold sweat shirts proclaiming a Packers victory.
And villagers in Nicaragua and Romania will be wearing that same cheeseheads-wish-it-were-true message on official NFL T-shirts and hats.
An alternative football reality?
No, it's all part of a humanitarian effort to use team wear that is produced in advance of championship games and otherwise would have to be destroyed.
"In places like Zambia and Nicaragua, people are very poor and often have never had a new piece of clothing in their lives," said Anne Duffy, a spokeswoman for World Vision, a Christian relief and development agency that distributes some of the unsalable National Football League and Major League Baseball sports clothing abroad. "So, for them to get a high-quality T-shirt, it brings them a tremendous sense of pride and joy."
Kids in remote Zambian villages are wearing T-shirts and hats that say Chicago won last year's Super Bowl - something that Windy City fans of Da Bears can do only in their dreams.
The NFL orders about 200 T-shirts and hats for each team in conference championship and Super Bowl games. It has donated the losing teams' items to World Vision since 1994, said Susan McBride Rothman, NFL vice president of consumer products.
World Vision also regularly gets donations of such items from two of the nation's largest team-wear retailers, Dick's Sporting Goods and the Sports Authority.
Last year, World Vision got a combined total of 102 pallets of Chicago Bears "champions" clothing with an estimated retail value of about $2.5 million after the Bears lost to the Indianapolis Colts in the Super Bowl, said Jeff Fields, senior director of corporate relations for World Vision.
The size of the Chicago market and the fervor of its fans caused some retailers to order more Bears gear in advance of the game than they normally do, Fields said.
World Vision later shipped that apparel to poor people in Zambia, Chad, Chile, Bolivia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, El Salvador, Romania and Zimbabwe.
It carefully distributes the clothing so that it doesn't end up on eBay, at U.S. flea markets or in overseas markets, Fields said.
He won't know exactly how much Packers gear there will be until shipments from retailers arrive. But he already knows that there will be at least 2,500 Packers items and 1,700 San Diego Chargers items. The Packers, of course, lost to the New York Giants; the Chargers fell to the New England Patriots.
Sports Authority had conference championship T-shirts ready to sell immediately after Sunday's games in its stores in the home markets of all four teams, said Craig McCormick, its licensed products buyer.
Though he did not have a count from last weekend, he said that normally 10% to 20% of a store's total championship game order is produced in advance.
"Your best selling window is going to be from the time the store opens after the game through that first day. The sooner you get it in that day, the more sales you are going to get," he said.
World Vision's focus for the team-wear distributions this year is on Nicaragua, Romania and other countries where there is an especially strong need. Cool-weather clothing such as sweat shirts could go to Mongolia, Romania and mountainous parts of Central America, Fields said.
When Packers lose, needy overseas win championship clothing
When Packers lose, needy overseas win championship clothing
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