Deportivo Municipal crams 1,000 micro-sponsors onto one jersey — Cannes Sport Grand Prix

Deportivo Municipal, the Lima club founded by municipal employees in 1935 and nicknamed 'La Academia', won four Peruvian championships but then slid through relegations, administrative problems and mounting debts. It lost its television rights, commercial contracts and main sponsor, ending up in amateur Copa Perú with the club at risk of disappearing.

Instead of hunting for one large sponsor, the club and McCann Lima launched 'The Thousand Sponsors of Muni' on 15 January 2026. The white shirt with its red diagonal sash was redesigned as a pixelated grid of ~1,000 black-and-white squares, and every square became a sponsorship slot sold from 200 soles (~€50).

Buyers — small shopkeepers, artisans, restaurateurs and ordinary supporters — became official club sponsors, entitled to sell club merchandise in their businesses and use player images to promote themselves. Within three months all 1,000 spaces were sold, raising 254,000 soles (~€65,000) and reaching more than 10.5 million people on social media.

The shirt became a global symbol of collective rescue, covered by media far beyond Peru. In June 2026 the campaign won the Entertainment for Sport Grand Prix at Cannes Lions (657 entries), and it is now cited as a template for participatory sports sponsorship.