Cercle Bruges Turns to Student Designers for Jersey Style

As featured on Wouter de Jonckheere's blog, Belgian soccer club Cercle Bruges is currently running a tremendous promotion that enables children from 216 participating schools to create and submit a jersey design for the team.

Cercle Bruges is offering to wear the winning jersey for the 2011 and 2012 seasons, which will draw plenty of interest and attention to the winning design. The only paramaters given to the student participants was that the submitted jersey designs must be green and black (representing the team's colors) and feature the names and team logo in a very visible fashion.

Cercle Bruges executed a similar promotional initiative in 2007 that proved to be very popular amongst the team's young fanbase and the local community. On November 15th, the team is expected to have a panel of judges, representing fashion and design, the team's outfitter, and some members of the organization choose the winning entry.

Teams, Leagues, and Brands Take a Community Focus...

Are you looking for new ways to demonstrate a commitment to the local community? Are you looking for ways to honor local citizens for their dedication to helping others?

Here are a few examples of ways that teams, leagues, and brands are stepping up to reward those making a difference in the local community:

Major League Baseball

Major League Baseball and Fox are teaming up to create a "giving back" message around the 2009 MLB All-Star Game. Prior to the game, President Obama will appear alongside former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter in a 7-minute video stressing the importance of goodwill and community service.

Major League Baseball is hoping that this message will help boost the morale of millions of Americans around the nation who have had to persevere through trying economic times. The league will honor people who have done goodwill in each of baseball's 30 markets at the game as well as the video shown prior to the live broadcast of the game.

This activation will complement the All-Star Charity Concert (presented by Pepsi) that features a live performance by Sheryl Crow under the Gateway Arch on Saturday, July 11th.

Home Depot

Home Depot is leveraging is partnership with Major League Soccer to host a promotion that enables Utah residents to nominate their community All-Stars for a chance to win a $1,000 Home Depot Gift Card and a 2009 MLS All-Star Game Prize Pack that includes two (2) tickets to the game. The promotion provides consumers the chance to tell why in 3,000 words their nominee should win the select award (based on their contributions to the community).

Tampa Bay Rays / Beef O'Brady's

The Tampa Bay Rays and Beef O'Brady's recently teamed up on an initiative to honor All-Star moms in the local Tampa marketplace. From July 7th to July 29th, kids of all ages can go to one (1) of 54 Beef O'Brady's locations across Tampa to register their moms for an array of prizes that include a personalized jersey, a private meet-and-greet with a Rays player, four tickets to an upcoming game, and a $100 gift card. The collaborating parties will choose five (5) lucky moms from hundreds of recipients to win the select prizes.