Nottingham Forest have confirmed that the expected rush for Nicklas Bendtner personalised shirts has not yet materialised, and that sales of shirts with the striker’s name on the back have actually not fluctuated at all over the last six months.
Extra part-time staff had been taken on at the Forest club shop to help erect barriers and to serve the expected high volume of customers, while HGVs have been arriving loaded solely with replica shirts carrying Bendtner’s name.
But hours after the doors opened for business, the crowds are yet to arrive, leaving Forest officials baffled.
Commercial campaign
“The sales of replica shirts with ‘Bendtner’ on the back haven’t been altered at all by the capture of Nicklas Bendtner, which is quite unusual,” a Forest spokesman told FFT.
“Looking at the figures, there’s been a rise in sales of exactly 0% from this time last month when the club hadn’t signed Nicklas Bendtner.
Please welcome Nicklas Bendtner who has joined #NFFC on a two-year deal
— @FAWAZ_ALHASAWI (@fawaz_alhasawi1) September 7, 2016
“In fact, the only customer we’ve had today was someone called ‘Ben Turner’ who had asked for us to scrape the letters off his personalised shirt because it looks too much like ‘Bendtner’.
“Extrapolating those figures out for the rest of the season, that’d be a 0% spike in Bendtner shirts sold running up to the end of the season,” the spokesman continued. “And… [taps at calculator] that indicates that we can expect to sell 0% more shirts between now and the end of human existence, or Bendtner joining a Chinese club – whichever happens first.
“We thought maybe they would need at least one for the official presentation, which would represent a rise of infinity per cent in sales, but the directors said they could just go with a plain one and then we can still sell that on afterwards, as long as Bendtner doesn’t drop it or kiss it or something.”
The club is drawing up a plan to use the thousands of unwanted shirts as rags to mop up spillages within the canteen, but a more lucrative alternative may be on the horizon after reports that Derby County’s club shop has been overwhelmed by demand for shirts that commemorate Forest’s new signing.
Please note: This satirical news story is not real. But you knew that already, obviously.
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