In this articleLEVINKEMCDFollow your favorite stocksCREATE FREE ACCOUNTGeneral view of the exterior of San Francisco Bay Area Stadium ahead of the FIFA World Cup 2026 Group B match between Qatar and Switzerland on June 13, 2026 in Santa Clara, California.Fran Santiago | Getty ImagesAs people around the world tune into this summer’s World Cup, some of the brands generating the most buzz aren’t even official sponsors of the tournament.The list of official sponsors for this year’s World Cup, hosted in cities across the U.S., Canada and Mexico, include global household names like Adidas, Coca-Cola and Qatar Airways.But even before the tournament began, the spotlight fell on companies like Levi Strauss & Co., Taco Bell and Texas-based convenience store chain Buc-ee’s. Some have garnered traction on social media for their creative marketing strategies, while others have benefited from organic customer response with the influx of international players and fans. McDonald’s celebrated the tournament with limited-time menu items and cups. Taco Bell leaned into a new campaign to support fans in celebration or support depending on the outcome of a match. According to marketing research firm WARC Media, advertising spending on this year’s World Cup tournament is expected to reach $10.5 billion. That’s just below spending for the 2018 World Cup, hosted by Russia, which totaled roughly $12.6 billion.Market intelligence firm Sensor Tower told CNBC that World Cup advertising spend increased 42% week over week in the days leading up to the first game. The firm tracked that Taco Bell and Duracell have both increased their advertising spend in the past few weeks, though the top 10 World Cup advertisers by spend over the past three months have been sponsors or broadcast partners of the event.According to market research firm Meltwater, in the ramp-up to the World Cup, non-sponsor brand collaborations generated nearly double the engagement of official sponsors, reaching roughly 61 million engagements versus just 33 million.The firm told CNBC that while sponsored advertisements led in volume, distribution and creative quality helped propel non-sponsors to higher engagement, with the most social media engagement coming from TikTok.Since the tournament began, non-sponsor brands have surpassed 57,000 mentions on social media versus just over 43,000 for official sponsors, the company said. “A big takeaway from this World Cup is that you don’t need an official sponsorship to own the cultural moment anymore,” Meltwater CEO John Box told CNBC. “The brands that will win the next tournament aren’t necessarily the ones with the biggest budgets, but instead the ones who are set up to see what’s trending in real time, the creativity to connect it back to your brand, and the speed to act before the moment passes.”World Cup resultsKylian Mbappé’s Nike soccer cleats during a French national team training session at Bentley University in Boston, Massachusetts, on June 20, 2026. The number 58 on the cleats represent the goals scored by Mbappé for the national team.Johnny Fidelin | Icon Sport | Getty ImagesAccording to Meltwater, Coca-Cola and Adidas accounted for half of all sponsor mentions in the buildup to the tournament. But in the final 11 days before the first match on June 11, McDonald’s became the clear winner, with engagement share rising from 2.6% to 23%. Of the non-sponsors, Lego accounted for 82% of the top 50 most engaging non-sponsor posts across social media platforms, Meltwater said. The construction toy company’s World Cup campaign delivered 12 times the sponsor average in the days leading up to the tournament.Nike, who is not an official tournament sponsor, saw its World Cup advertisement — featuring celebrities like Kim Kardashian, Travis Scott and Lebron James as well as scores of World Cup stars like Norway breakout Erling Haaland and Portugal captain Cristiano Ronaldo — rake in more than 70 million views on YouTube. Sneaker rival Adidas counts roughly 7 million views for its advertisement featuring actor Timothée Chalamet, Argentina captain Lionel Messi and more.That gap is indicative of the winners and losers of the off-pitch advertising battle during the tournament, according to Andrew Rohm, a professor of marketing at Loyola Marymount University.”It was just interesting how those two brands took totally different approaches to their four- to five-minute pieces of content, and I loved the Nike approach because it was totally on-brand, irreverent, unexpected, in your face,” Rohm told CNBC. “You don’t have to be an official sponsor to tie back into the cultural social importance of a worldwide global event like the World Cup, especially if you have assets like Nike has that you can deploy towards that.”When it comes to the advertising winners of this year’s World Cup, Rohm said it’s a battle between “the expected and the unexpected.” The companies that aren’t official sponsors and are therefore not restricted by FIFA are able to have the most fun with their marketing, he said.One brand making the most of its non-sponsor status is denim brand Levi’s. Because the company isn’t an official backer of the tournament, its branding on the host stadium in Santa Clara, California, had to be removed before matches. The Lev …
