Still little Oranje-fever despite Lionesses reaching World Cup quarter-finals

The Oranje football players are hindered by their playing times at the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. Mainly because of this, Oranje-tinted advertisements and promotions from retailers are not yet getting off the ground, even though national coach Andries Jonker’s team has reached the quarter-finals. The Oranje fever is expected to rise if the Lionesses also beat Spain early on Friday.

More and more Netherlands residents are turning on the television for the football players’ matches. In the night from Saturday to Sunday, over 660,000 people watched the eighth final against South Africa on NPO1. Just under 400,000 people watched the group match of the Lionesses against the United States, the only previous game the football players played during Dutch night. Football association KNVB had counted on lower viewing figures.

It has not yet led to companies purchasing more advertising time on television around Friday’s quarterfinals at 3:00 a.m. Dutch time. The Ether Advertising Foundation (Ster), which sells advertising space for public broadcasters, expects interest to increase if the football players reach the semi-finals or finals. Those matches are played during the daytime in the Netherlands.

TV marketing organization Screenforce endorses Ster’s image. Director Michel van der Voort adds that “linking into a World Cup or European Championship takes a long time to prepare” and that “advertisers find it difficult to realize that for such a short period of time.”

The KNVB thinks companies will respond more to the Oranje fever in the coming days, mainly through social media. Precisely because there is no more time for television advertising and the target group can also be reached online, said Dennis Hogenboom, the KNVB manager for partnerships. Companies that have advertisements about the football players include ING, Albert Heijn, and KPN. According to Hogenboom, only ING has explicit commercials on television.

In the shopping street, too, you can hardly see that a football World Cup is going on. Retailers’ association INretail attributes this to the unfavorable playing time. “It is in line because, before the last World Cup for men, there was already less attention from retailers,” said Jeroen van Dijken, director of interests and policy. That was then because the tournament was in Qatar, and there were concerns about human rights in the country.

INretail also expects retailers to join the Oranje fever if the football players reach the final four. Shops will then come up with offers for televisions and Oranje gadgets, for example, expects Van Dijken.