There are few things worse in this Auburn life than a Lee County Bama fan. Which means that the Academy Sports in Auburn might, God forbid (please, God—forbid, forbid hard, with the rage of 1,000 honey badgers), literally be the last place on earth you’d want to be on Monday night.
The sporting goods chain is, like last year, plastering its Alabama locations with signage alerting shoppers that stores will be on standby to sell pre-printed BCS Championship gear in the event of a Tide win… and the Auburn store is no exception.
Ignoring the footballin’ folkways and mores of regional markets is the kind of boneheaded marketing that leads to boycotts (Auburn fans don’t play around), the kind that could cancel out (and then some) whatever profits they anticipate taking in from the unwashed.
That the giant “Roll Tide” banner was recently removed from the roof would indicate that they’re already catching flack, but the entrance (and we’re assuming the back room) continues to live in sin.
h/t Kenny Smith; roof photo via the Auburn Villager, which quotes a manager on the lack of LSU gear.
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I stopped that that Academy in Auburn… and returned something. They won’t get any money from me with that $hit all over it.
Good for you Will. I refuse to shop at Academy anyway, this just strengthens that belief.
War Eagle!
A fair question to ask is “Did the Tuscaloosa Academy Sports plaster giant “War Eagle” posters last year”? If so, then no biggie. If not, well…
Makes you wonder what they’ll do with all the irrelevant “bama wins” t-shirts after the game doesn’t it? geAUx Tigers!!
If they had a clue and wanted to make some money, the manager should throw up a Geaux Tigers sign out front, I might hate LSU more than Bama if they lose this game…I would hate to have a reason to hate the number 14
Dick’s is doing it too (nice of ABC33/40 to give them a free commercial):
http://www.abc3340.com/story/16466568/if-tide-wins-get-your-championship-gear-right-after-the-game
AUTiger85: All that stuff gets shipped to developing nations, despite there being a market for error merchandise (think of baseball cards). And, if they could buy it, in a few years Alabama would still call it a championship.
Has anyone b*tched…I mean complained to Academy Sports Corporate? I plan on writing them a nasty gram. Be sure to include this TWER news link to show that it’s not just one person who is p*ssed.
http://www.academy.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ContactUs_10151_10051_-1
Or you could contact the Opelika-Auburn News and ask them to run a story to alert the Auburn residents.
http://www2.oanow.com/contact_us/news/
@Marcus- good point.
They have great equipments at store, but they have to train their staffs how to handle the customers.