Following the announcement earlier this month from the NFL that players are banned from wearing Beats by Dre headphones during league-related television broadcasts, Beats co-founder Jimmy Iovine reacted to the news.
“We didn’t do anything, and now the players are going out and putting black tape on our logo,” Iovine said according to Business Insider. “It’s like, I can’t believe I’m this lucky. I feel like sending them the tape.”
The league’s recent ban followed an announcement in August that Bose has become the exclusive provider of headsets for the NFL. Last week, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick was fined $10,000 for wearing a set of pink Beats in a post-victory press conference. Earlier this week, Kaepernick again wore a pink set of Beats but attempted to skirt the league’s regulations by obscuring the company logo with athletic tape.
Addressing the cultural impact of the ban, Jimmy Iovine hinted that the decision will hurt Bose in the long run.
“What happened there, you have a tech company that’s culturally inept,” Iovine said. “There’s no one at the company that said, ‘If you ban these guys, you’re going to look bad to the young people, and they’re going to look like superheroes even though they’re just pure capitalists—well they’re not pure capitalists, but they’re real capitalists and [they] sold that company to Apple—but you’re going to make them look like the underdog.”
In a recent statement to CNET the NFL reportedly defended their ban and compared it to similar regulations affecting footwear in league play.
“This is similar to the policy for footwear—Nike and Under Armour are the only footwear brands that receive exposure on field game-day,” an NFL rep said. “Players can wear any brand of footwear but must tape over logos of brands unless they are Nike and Under Armour.”
Shortly after the NFL’s original announcement of the ban, Beats released a statement claiming that “athletes have written Beats into their DNA as part of the pre-game ritual.”
RELATED: will.i.am Details Beats Electronics Role With Jimmy IovineJ
Bose makes a far superior product than Beats ever will.
But what you don’t realized is that Beats made people change from wearing earbuds. About 3 years ago, everyone was wearing earbuds and their music was sounding crappy but folks didn’t care. BOSE never had the for thought to say, “let’s make people listen to music differnent….make it cool”…BEATS did that and did it well. True, BEATS are not as good in some cases to a BOSE PRO or Seinnheiser HD PRO but they are not far behind…plus they have built in amps on board, wireless, non wireless, cool colors, culturally excepted. What have the other brands done before beats? I’ll wait….
You still waiting?
Beats by Dre sux, there are way way better headphones for less money on the market
boobs
Bose lost.
The best way to make a brand “hip” and popular is to have it banned or forbidden. Now BEATS gets all this free publicity and will become even more accepted in urban America and beyond.
and in the end the product is still shit, just like apples new iphone
Bose doesn’t need to be “hip”, they’ve been a heavy hitter in sound products for long before Beats was a thought…and shame on Iovine for acting like he doesn’t understand the business decision the NFL is making out of sponsorship. Kids are gonna buy Beats regardless, people who want a reputable sound product with a long history will by Bose…kids who want to be “cool” will wear beats for fashion as much as sound.
koss porta are da best ya heard!?
BEATS were banned because Dr Dre is a 3 time woman beater, and the NFL is trying to steer clear of any kind of abuse stories, after everything that has happened recently.
i bet half the nfl team owners all beat their wifeys