Dead and Irrelevant Brands Turn to Pro Cycling for Revival (Satire)

It seems that long-forgotten brands are seeking to return to former glory by employing their sponsorship of pro cycling teams for promotion.

“Why should Radio Shack be the only dinosaur brand out there?” asks Penny Mortensen, Director of Marketing Communications for Team Bennigan’s. “We figured why the hell not?  Nothing else has ever worked.”

The new channel has given new enthusiasm to those tasked with reviving fading brands.

“We haven’t been relevant for years and we thought this would be a good way to blow the dust off our brand,” continues Mortensen. “We’re either going to come out looking cool by getting involved in something hip and fashionable, or we’re going drag the beautiful sport of cycling down with us. Screw them and their sissy shorts. It’s not like any one of them has ever come near one of our delicious burgers anyway.”

Others businesses desperate to breathe new life into their image are quick to follow suit.

“Radio Shack’s move was unprecedented,” explains Brad Gorman, Director of Team Gleem announced last month. “The rest of us in the Forgotten Legions of Obsolete Products and Services (FLOPS) just went ‘Whoah! Those clever bastards!’ ”

Soon to be announced are teams from Der Wienerschnitzel, Montgomery Ward, Hush Puppy, Fuller Brush, and most recently, RC Cola.

“We’re tired of being the third or fourth cola choice. We want to knock those jerks at Fanta off their high horses,” proclaims Terry Rombauer-Platt, Marketing Manager at RC. “Ok, so maybe we’re more like the fifth or sixth choice…Definitely no lower than eighth. Honestly, we’re looking to crack the top 10. Shut up!”

Some dismiss Radio Shack’s move as foolhardy, but “I disagree,” says Mort Krumpton, Chief Marketing Officer for Chic Jeans. “It isn’t easy to sustain a brand for what, like, 170 years? You don’t last that long solely on chumps buying adapters and batteries from geeky, pimple-faced idiots.

“They were selling cheap electronic crap before there was electricity. No, someone with a brain is behind it all. Unless there’s just been a revolving door of incompetent CEOs driving the brand deeper into the ground while sucker shareholders think ‘Maybe this one will turn it around.’ What? Oh...”

Krumpton, who until recently served as Chair for the Desperate Organization of Laggards Trying to Survive (DOLTS), oversaw the merger of his organization with FLOPS earlier in the year.

“By combining the forces of FLOPS and DOLTS, we will create new and exciting ways for consumers to find relevance in our brands. Either that, or we’ll live forever in infamy on YouTube for running pathetic and tasteless commercials that flushed the last of our money and sent us into bankruptcy. Again. That, and forcing otherwise respected and proud athletes to act as shills for our worthless dreck.

“At the very least, we hope to end up with some cool cycling gear we can probably sell on eBay.”