De-Juicing a Fathead

What did Fathead do when Alex Rodriguez admitted steroid use?

Getty Images

How does Fathead respond to steroid scandals?

During the period in which Barry Bonds was taking enough cream and clear to make Big Brown blush, his hat size increased from 7 1/8 to a full 7 1/4, even though he went with the pared down shaved look. A good marketing opportunity for then upstart Fathead, right?

Not exactly.

"We couldn't have done a Barry Bonds Fathead if we wanted to," says Linda Castillon, Fathead's VP for Licensing. But that's because Fathead was perhaps spared the clash between fans of the embattled slugger and the loud group that loathes him because Barry had opted out of the collective bargaining agreement. Major League Baseball couldn't license his image, and Fathead couldn't touch it.

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Bonds aside, a quick look at the perpetually growing Fathead roster shows not one baseball star to have suffered public scorn over steroids. No Giambi, Clemens, Pettite or even a Big Mac. And if you bring up the past-their-prime argument, take a look at football, where Emmitt Smith and even Joe Montana are lifesize stickers.

Except, that is, for Alex Rodriguez. So what do they do? A Fathead 60 Minutes edition? Buy A-Rod, get Morley Safer half off!

"We see the league as a partner, and we make the decision in tandem," says Castillon. With A-Rod, "We had not seen a significant drop in his sales, and we went to the league and asked them what we should do." According to Castillon, MLB told Fathead that they could make the call, but they also noted that A-Rod's fans seem as passionate as ever, and his sales on other merchandise remained strong across the board. "We're seeing that his fans aren't running away from him on this issue," says Castillon. Fathead hasn't seen a decline in sales, and thus A-Rod remains available, if you're ready to pony up $99.99.

Other cases went differently.

There was the time when CNN headlines from the NFL's offices in New York to the Fathead offices in Livonia, Michigan were showing overhead shots of what turned out to be a massive dog housing and fighting operation in the wooded area behind a home owned by one of their best-selling football stars. A quick call to the NFL, and…

"We took (the) product down and immediately removed it from the web site—to get rid of the problem," says Castillon.

And a Michael Vick "orange suit" Fathead won't be forthcoming—not that Castillon thinks such things couldn't possibly sell.

She and the Fathead folks certainly appreciate the collectors appeal of flawed merchandise—we mention the famed Billy Ripken "F--- Face" card—or even the draw of the tainted star, but the company is a licensed partner of the leagues it represents. So even if Fathead saw Vick's fall as an opportunity for a fun promotion, a spat between them and the NFL wouldn't just be a public relations fall-out, it would be bad business.

So what do they do with T.O.? There's a mountain of #81 Dallas versions now. Fathead is aiming for the collector's route, hoping Owens will sign 81 of them to be sold. Check in the dumpster for the rest.

Then they need to get Owens in a new, flat, adhesive jersey. And fast.

"We could make a T.O. pretty fast," says Castillon. "The fastest image we ever created was Brett Favre as a Jet. Our Getty [Images] guys snapped him at one of his first practices with the Jets and our design team put their magic touches on it and zapped it to our operations team and our web team got it up for pre-sale. Total time —about six weeks. It was priceless."

Not as priceless as a Bonds Fathead. Of course, it'd be a fake.

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