European Championship with Red Devils creates huge turnover boost

Beer production cannot keep up

Carrefour’s annual report on 2014 showed that Belgian turnover had grown 3.9 % during the World Championship football and according to the chain, this increase was largely down to campaigns revolving around the World Championship football. Belgian growth was more than twice as large as Carrefour’s worldwide growth.

“Dutch investigators believe supermarkets will generate 10 million euro additional turnover for each match, but we do not know what forms the basis for these estimates”, Jos Verschueren – VUB’s (Open University of Brussels) director of sports management – said to Sporza. “If I do the calculations, then that amount could be higher. Image every Belgian spends one additional euro, then you quickly get an additional 11 million euro. One euro does not seem to be a lot, to me.”

The hospitality industry also performs very well during these moments: Verschueren feels consumers spend more than they are used and only realize they have spent more than they were going to much later. Even Belgian brewers could end up in trouble. “We know from several well-placed sources that if Belgium managed to beat Argentina, Belgium would have had no more Jupiler to drink. The beer production would not have been able to follow.” AB InBev did deny that claim however.

There is a flip side…

On average, a Belgian consumer spends 12 euro on equipment to support their team, which represents 132 million euro. The average abroad is higher, but that is partly because of the huge amount of gadgets companies hand out during major tournaments. If those free gadgets are added to the cost, then the average amount per person increases to some 20 euro.

University KUL sports marketeer Wim Lagae added the notion that consumers may spend more on the Red Devils, they might also cut costs on other items: people may decide to postpone the purchase of a dishwasher in the time frame prior to a European Championship and use that money to buy a television instead. Bars may get a lot of additional visitors, but restaurants and movie theaters may get fewer visitors”, Lagae told Sporza.