First they came for your stadium. Now they’re coming for your ketchup.

In the press box of “San Francisco Bay Area Stadium,” the Santa Clara venue usually known as Levi’s Stadium and rebranded for (opens in new tab) the World Cup, would-be hot dog and hamburger condiments were rendered anonymous Saturday by thick strips of black tape.

FIFA, in its quixotic quest to protect the sanctity of paid sponsorship, had apparently dispatched workers to obscure the brand names on ketchup, mustard, soy sauce, and hot sauce. The exhaustive effort went so far as to affix black tape on the top half inch of a bottle of Tabasco. The result was a master class in futility that delighted observers far more than any logo.

Workers also taped over logos of the giant dispensers of sauce available to the public.

The tape, intended to limit visibility for nonsponsoring brands, instead drew attention to exactly what it tried to hide. “This looks like the CIA cafeteria,” quipped (opens in new tab) Josh Billinson, an editor at Semafor. 

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The reviews of the condiment lineup were strong, tape notwithstanding. “FIFA really spoiling the media with two different types of Kikkoman soy sauce to choose from,” sportswriter James Nalton said (opens in new tab). “Babe what’s wrong you’ve hardly touched your [redacted],” comedian Jordan Davis said (opens in new tab).

Others questioned the logistics. “I’d like to see AI take THAT job,” author Chris DeRose said (opens in new tab). 

The practice, it turns out, is not unique to FIFA.

Lisa P. Ramsey, a law professor (opens in new tab) at the University of San Diego who specializes in trademark and international intellectual property law, said the taped-over condiments are a contract matter rather than a legal requirement.

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“This is how FIFA makes their money — allowing brands to be official sponsors,” Ramsey said. FIFA can prohibit companies from falsely claiming to be official sponsors, she said, but hosting a World Cup match doesn’t give the organization the right to stop people from using a trademark.

Ramsey pointed to the doctrine of nominative fair use, which permits use of a trademark to refer to that company or its products, so long as no false suggestion of a business connection is made. Under trademark law, she said, a stadium can put out condiments at a match or watch party without issue. The tape, she said, almost certainly traces back to the contracts that countries and cities sign for the privilege of hosting games.

“There’s no international law that requires the stadiums to cover up the logos on the condiments,” Ramsey said. “This is really just FIFA, basically by contract, requiring this to happen.”

She noted that FIFA has been aggressive enough in asserting its rights over the years that many people assume approval is required, when it is not. 

Ramsey said she found the condiment photos circulating on social media to be more amusing than alarming. She could identify several of the brands by their packaging, she said, which raises a separate point about how trade dress — the colors, shapes, and designs of product packaging — can itself be protected.

Levi’s Stadium has apparently seen the marketing potential, temporarily changing its social media profile photo to its wrapped version.

“It’s a good look for the brand, and I’m sure they had quite the war room about this,” said Oren John, a creative director and marketing influencer (opens in new tab), who said that Levi’s marketing decisions had lit up his group chat.

“We are in a moment where comms teams and social teams are so conditioned on how to respond and adapt things to their own bidding that the era of brand protection, FIFA trying to be locked down — they’re almost missing the point,” John said. “The response is going to get more attention than if they had just left the logo alone.”

In the end, the black tape may amount to a marketing windfall for the very brands it was meant to obscure, Ramsey suggested. The episode, she said, might turn out to be good PR for the condiment makers.

Hot dogs and hamburgers, presumably, were eaten anyway.