Belgian football has joined the ranks of organisations rolling out coronavirus paraphernalia, with clubs across the country announcing they are putting branded face masks up for sale.
In Brussels, Molenbeek's RWDM has already published images of face masks with stamped with their logo which will reportedly go for €7 apiece.
At least two other Brussels clubs, Royale Union Saint-Gilloise and RSC Anderlecht have also announced plans to sell coronavirus merchandise to supporters.
Clubs' move to being marketing face masks comes after the federal government made the use of face masks mandatory in public transport in order to progressively begin easing Belgium's nationwide lockdown.
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In Flanders and Wallonia, several clubs have already added mouth masks to their online shops with already some raking in significant gains.
For €20, fans of Liège's Standard and Ghent's KAA can already purchase a pack of four and five masks, respectively, in the stripes of their favourite team.
For each pack sold, the Walloon football club will cash in €18 and donate €2 to their own foundation, the Fondation Standard de Liège, which leads a number of community initiatives and is currently engaged in the fight against the coronavirus, according to the club's website.
KAA Ghent also said that proceeds from the sell of their branded masks will go to their foundation, without specifying amounts, and Club Brugge will also funnel €2 from each sail into a coronavirus fund.
Fans have responded enthusiastically, with clubs in Ghent and Brugges saying that masks had been snatched up in the thousands by supporters in a matter of hours.
On Monday, KAA Ghent and Club Brugge said that they had sold, respectively, 10,000 and 37,000 masks in one day, while in Wallonia, some supporters took to social media to share pictures of themselves with branded masks.
Like the football clubs in Belgium, organisations across the world —in areas ranging from sports to entertainment and even politics— have moved to stamp their logos on face masks, with demand for them surging as governments make their use in public mandatory as they begin to unwind country-wide lockdowns brought on by the deadly coronavirus pandemic.
Gabriela Galindo
The Brussels Times
