Cheeky female design team are on the ball

Euro 2008 is not just about balls, boys and big business. A small female graphic design team from Lausanne have found an original way of joining the game.

Launched in February as a fun project to promote the alafolie design company, the “Les filles s’en foot” range of T-shirts with tongue-in-cheek messages for girls – and boys – is doing a roaring trade online.

Alafolie is just one of hundreds of small, on-the-ball Swiss companies using guerrilla marketing tactics to sharpen their profile and cash in on the European football championships, taking place in Switzerland and Austria from June 7-29.

Marisa De Oliveira and her longstanding friend and colleague Diane Warpelin came up with the idea of creating something light-hearted and slightly provocative for women not particularly interested in football, who “prefer men who run after them rather than the ball”.

“Last autumn we decided we should do something for Euro 2008. A T-shirt is a good way of passing a message,” said Marisa, who founded the company four years ago.

The result is a series of T-shirts, vests, bags and hot pants for women, men and babies, with cheeky double entendre slogans, such as “Entraineuse” (coach or go-go girl), “Match nul” (draw or terrible match) or “Attaquante” (attacker).

Although they admit to not being big football fans, the designers don’t want to be seen as militant anti-football feminists.

“I watch the Euro or the World Cup, but it depends on the atmosphere at the bar,” laughs Marisa. “We want to have fun with the others even if we don’t understand everything that’s going on and don’t really care if we don’t get it all.”

But since “Les filles s’en foot” kicked off, it’s been no half-time rest for the duo.

As well as promoting the online clothing business, together with a team of girlfriends, they plan to organise and participate in local football events during the tournament.

“We didn’t expect so much enthusiasm; it’s a lot of work and we also have our normal clients to look after,” said Diane.

The team also creates designs for Lausanne City council, Philip Morris and Nestlé, among others.

Whip up enthusiasm

Despite joking about their lack of knowledge about game tactics, they remain attracted by football’s pull-factor.

“We like the public enthusiasm. I’m impressed by the number of people who go to watch matches. There are not many of these kind of events, so it makes you want to take part and be there – and not be stuck in a tea room,” said Diane.

But looking at the pre-match build-up, both are perplexed by the lack of local Euro fever in Switzerland.

“We are looking forward to the Euro starting, as the amount of time we’ve been talking about it… we want to get excited a bit, but at the moment we don’t feel any excitement at all,” said Marisa.

“You don’t sense the interest. The Swiss are quite passive. They will celebrate when it’s over and say it went well; we talk first about the problems and not the celebration.”

Diane also felt the Swiss had been slow to whip up enthusiasm about the third-biggest sporting event in the world.

“They don’t prepare people here. We are not really bombarded with advertising; it’s rather timid. In France, for example, they would have had Euro 2008 TV and radio adverts six months ago,” she said.

Although they are not big football fans, the “Les filles s’en foot” project should help bring them important visibility and contacts.

It has also been an interesting learning curve, opening their eyes to the world of online business and their work as a team.

“It’s good fun, a laugh that will go on during the championships. But no extra-time! Business isn’t really a world that suits me,” said Diane.

“I’m more: “Lets party, we’ve got a good idea, cool”, but if “Les filles s’en foot” goes beyond what we’ve done so far – I’m out of my depth.”

“I’m the more business-oriented one,” said Marisa. “I’m the one who pushes in that direction. But that’s why it works as team: we’re complementary.”

swissinfo, Simon Bradley in Lausanne

Euro 2008

Switzerland will co-host the Euro 2008 football tournament together with Austria from June 7-29.

The 31 games will be played in four cities in Switzerland (Basel, Bern, Geneva and Zurich) and four cities in Austria (Innsbruck, Klagenfurt, Salzburg and Vienna).

The Letzigrund stadium in Zurich will play host to three matches: Romania – France on June 9, Italy – Romania on June 13 and France – Italy on June 17.

Up to 5.4 million football fans are expected to follow the tournament in Switzerland, including 1.4 million from abroad.

Swiss Federal Railways has announced it will put on an extra 3,800 services to its timetable and deploy 1,500 special customer advisors during the tournament.