Panini Football Stickers: The Official Celebration: A Nostalgic Journey Through the World of Panini

By Greg Lansdowne

'A heady mix of football history, nostalgia and modern-day action that collectors of all ages will cherish' – When Saturday Comes

'Excellent... This book is like a journey through time, revealing some of the coolest-ever albums and stickers' – Match

'Countless memories come flooding back...' – The Sun

'Lovely book… One for your dad…' TalkSPORT

'A cool, snappy retrospective if the last 60 years of albums.' – The Athletic

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WELCOME TO THE GLORIOUS WORLD OF PANINI FOOTBALL STICKERS.

Collecting Panini football stickers has always been a joy.

Tearing open those packets and excitedly filling an album is a rite of passage for millions of kids – and adults. It's so popular, it even has its own language – 'swapsies', 'got, got, need' and 'shinies'.

And now, for the first time, Panini have granted access to their archives for this superbly illustrated celebration of their iconic football sticker collections.

Licensed by Panini and written by respected sticker authority Greg Lansdowne, this volume showcases Panini's UK domestic football, FIFA World Cup and UEFA European Championship albums, as well as all the great players, from Pelé and Maradona to Marta, Ronaldo and Mbappé (via Frank Worthington, Chris Waddle, Gary Lineker, Eric Cantona, Ally McCoist and a few dodgy haircuts).

A heady mix of football history, wonderful nostalgia and modern-day action that collectors of all ages will cherish, this book shows why, for the last 60 years, collecting Panini stickers has been – and remains – a global phenomenon.

PANINI FOOTBALL STICKERS: A CELEBRATION includes:
– More than 2,000 images of iconic PANINI stickers, album covers and sticker packet designs
– Specially curated chapters on every UK-published collection (Football League/FIFA World Cup)
– Breakout features on foils, haircuts styles and collecting etiquette

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Nov 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9781472987747

Greg Lansdowne

Greg Lansdowne is a leading authority on PANINI sticker albums and the author of Stuck on You: The Rise and Fall...and Rise of Panini Stickers and Panini Football Stickers: The Official Celebration. @Panini_book

Book preview

CONTENTS

Introduction

The Panini Story

Mexico 70

The Joy of Buying

München 74

The Joy of Swapping

Football 78

Argentina 78

How Panini Stickers are Made

Football 79

Around the World: Germany

Football 80

Europa 80

Football 81

Football 82

Around the World: France

Espana 82

Shinies, Foils and Glimmers

Football 83

The Joy of Sticking

Football 84

Euro 84

Football 85

Stylish Managers

Football 86

Mexico 86

Around the World: Spain

Football 87

Football 88

Euro 88

Football 89

Football 90

The Joy of Collecting

Italia 90

Around the World: Rest of the World

Football 1991

Changing Hairstyles

Football 1992

Euro 92

Football 93

Panini Style

Copa America

USA 94

England 96

France 98

Around the World: Italy

Euro 2000

Korea/Japan 2002

Facial Hair

Euro 2004

Panini Legends

Germany 2006

Euro 2008

Africa Cup of Nations

South Africa 2010

Germany 2011

Euro 2012

Brasil 2014

Canada 2015

Euro 2016

Euro 2017

Russia 2018

France 2019

Football 2020

INTRODUCTION

For millions of kids it was just sheer joy, played out in schoolyards and local newsagents, where grubby hands would part with pocket money in return for precious stickers. It would all start with Shoot! or Roy of the Rovers giving away a free album and a packet, which would signal the beginning of months of collecting and swapping, including lying in bed wondering how best to get those priceless ‘needs’ off your mates. Even the smell of the stickers created a desire to get your hands on them.

If one brand symbolises the evocative world of football sticker collecting it is, of course, Panini. And as it celebrates its 60th anniversary in 2021, allow Panini Football Stickers: The Official Celebration to take you back to the world of ‘Got, Got, Need’.

The UK was first introduced to Panini via its Mexico 70 World Cup collection and, although it took some time for the concept to get under the nation’s skin, by the 1980s an incredible nine out of every ten UK schoolchildren were buying Panini stickers in one way or another. Every World Cup (and European Championship) since has meant the release of a highly anticipated Panini album, all of which are gloriously chronicled in this book.

In Britain, the age of Panini really kicked off in January 1977. Prior to that, cards or picture stamps – often erratically produced and needing to be glued down – had been the collectables of choice. But nothing was ever the same again for football fans from the moment Panini gave away Euro Football via Shoot! It was a classy album, providing an education on the world of football beyond this nation’s shores. Not only that, the stickers were self-adhesive – just peel off the backs and away you went. At the time, it was revolutionary and it was clear there was something a little bit special about Panini.

If Panini’s first mainstream outing wasn’t enough to pull the punters in, their debut UK domestic album – Football 78 – ended any debate over where the pocket money of a whole generation of school kids would be going. And perhaps the highlight of this book is the coverage of those albums, from Football 78 to Football 93, which have never been laid out in all their splendour until now. From Laurie Cunningham and Kenny Dalglish in Football 78 to Tony Adams and Alan Shearer in Football 93, Panini’s UK designs showcased this period in British football history with a style no other collectables company could match.

And talking of style, no one would deny that this period featured some of the most iconic fashions ever seen in football. The beards and moustaches were bushy and abundant, but it was the big hairstyles – the perms, mullets, afros and New Romantic highlights – that really made the period so memorable. Add in the sheepskins, tracksuits and cardigans worn by tough-looking managers and you have a pictorial history of an entire era, all featured heavily in the pages of this book.

Panini eventually became the sophisticated embodiment of everything a collector wanted from a football album. With a lingo all of its own – ‘Doublers’, ‘Swapsies’, ‘Shinies’ and ‘Scrambles’ – collecting Panini became a lifestyle.

The Modena-founded business has always documented the greatest players of every era – often looking youthful at their first clubs, or during their first appearances for their national sides. From Pelé and Moore to Platini and Maradona, and from Messi and Ronaldo to Mbappé and Haaland, Panini has been at the forefront of featuring world-class talent. And while there have been many stars on Panini’s pages over the years, few have been eyed as longingly as the bicycle-kicking footballer who launched a million collections. Spotting the character on a packet has always been the mark of quality for collectors.

At its peak, Panini was reportedly selling in the region of 100 million packets of stickers for their annual UK football album alone. Decades later, sticker fervour is as strong as ever in Britain, Europe and the world. And as women’s football comes to the fore, a whole new market has opened up, fully embraced by the company as it produces Women’s World Cup and European Championship albums.

All of these facets, when fused together, make the Panini world of buying, swapping, sticking and collecting a delight. For all those who know what it’s like to pine for that missing Ian Rush sticker that always eluded them, welcome to Panini Football Stickers: The Official Celebration.

THE PANINI STORY

This is the tale of how the Panini company revolutionised the football trading card and sticker album market, and created a core element of modern football culture and a truly global phenomenon.

Playground crazes have come and gone over the last 60 years…

Many have had their day – quite a few have even had a second coming – but you will be hard pressed to find a more enduring ‘fad’ than the art of collecting Panini stickers.

The Panini brothers started out working with their mother Olga in the family’s newstand on Corso Duomo street. In the picture Giuseppe (left) and Umberto (right).

It’s not that the Panini brothers of Modena, Italy, kicked off the vogue for football collectables – John Baines of Bradford, England, is credited with inventing the football card in 1885. Cards in cigarette packets with star footballers on were hugely popular for decades after and comic books gave them away for free to boost sales. Later, trading cards were packaged up with bubble gum and also sold as picture stamps, to be glued into an album.

Then Panini blew everyone away!

Starting out on the family’s news stand on the Corso Duomo street, brothers Benito and Giuseppe set up the Panini Brothers newspaper distribution office in 1954. Their first dabble with collectables came around 1960 when they packaged up images of plants and flowers, managing to sell an encouraging amount of packets of ‘figurine’ – stickers – for 10 Lire each.

But while this was an early success, if there was one passion that exceeded all others in Italy it was football. The Panini brothers acquired a batch of unsold cards from the Gol collection, produced by Milanese company Nannina for the 1960–61 season, and their success in rehabilitating those cards became the key to future global success.

The Fratelli Panini Distribution Agency was founded in 1961 with the showpiece Calciatori (football players) album – Grande Raccolta Figurine Calciatori in full – launching during the 1961–62 season. Several million packets were sold for the first album, and many more snapped up the following season once word had spread.

Demand was so high that two more Panini brothers were brought on board, Umberto and Franco, by means of whom production and international development were duly covered.

Football was the global game and the success of Panini – and other collectable brands in Italy – did not go unnoticed elsewhere. Similar albums began to sprout up in other football hotbeds, such as Germany, Spain and the Netherlands.

Panini ventured out of its homeland via collaborations with Williams Förlags AB, in Sweden, and Top Sellers, a London-based publisher, in England. Cards for the Football 72 albums in England and Fotboll 71 in Sweden stated on the back of the cards that they were ‘Printed in Italy by Panini 1971’. The relationship with Top Sellers lasted longer than the Scandinavian tie-up, running all the way through to Football 77.

That 1976–77 season was a pivotal one for Panini as far as the UK was concerned. From that point, all bets were off. While many consider Football 78 as Panini’s breakthrough album in Britain it was, in fact, Euro Football that changed the UK football collectables market irrevocably.

There were many factors behind the success of Euro Football – all as crucial as the others. Firstly, it was given away with a January 1977 issue of Shoot! the biggest-selling kids’ magazine of the time, along with free packets of stickers, to begin the fixation.

Secondly, it was a slickly-designed album featuring British clubs that had qualified for that season’s European club competitions, along with the finest club sides from the continent – providing an education for enquiring young minds used to collecting sets of recurring domestic players.

Thirdly, while collectors in the UK had been used to needing glue to stick in picture stamps, Panini put an end to that. Their images were self-adhesive, coming with backs that peeled off, leaving what remained to be placed – with care – into the album.

Panini’s first album entirely made up of self-adhesive stickers had been the Calciatori 1972–73, as the first World Cup album, Mexico 70, had still been made up primarily of cards, with stickers restricted to the qualifiers’ flags and emblems, along with a handful of other images.

Giuseppe Panini founded Panini in 1961 with the help of brother Benito. Umberto and Franco Panini joined the company in 1963.

The automatic ‘fifimatic’ packaging machine invented by Umberto Panini: it gathers the stickers and packets them.

The Swedish star Nils Liedholm, who played for AC Milan, appeared on the cover of the first issue of Calciatori.

So Euro Football really caught the imagination, but that was nothing compared to the excitement generated by the release of Panini’s first UK domestic album, Football 78. With the starter pack again given away free with Shoot!, now there was the chance for collectors to find their favourites in English and Scottish football, providing they were in the English First and Second Divisions, or Scotland’s Premier Division.

While the thrill of discovering self-adhesive stickers was now a given, Panini’s new football album issue in the UK provided a further, welcoming, sight for collectors. Always at the forefront of pioneering technology, Panini had given the club badges a shiny, metallic foil sheen to make them stand out not only from the rest of the stickers in the packet, but all other football collectables of the age.

While the images of the top players of the day – in card or sticker form – had always been hard to prise away from fellow enthusiasts, these ‘shinies’ meant collectors had literally, and metaphorically, seen the light.

The Football 78 red sticker packet cover for the UK depicted a bicycle-kicking footballer in front of a Union Jack background. That design – only the colours would change – became iconic over the next decade as it was repeated all the way through to Football 88. In that pre-internet age it’s likely that only a few sticker fans realised that the illustration had been inspired by Italy and Juventus defender, Carlo Parola.

The iconic Panini logo is inspired by the bicycle kick of Carlo Parola.

In the same way, most of us would have been oblivious to the story behind the equally ubiquitous image on Panini albums and packets of a knight holding his trusty lance. Giuseppe Panini’s love of devising his own crossword puzzles – using the pseudonym ‘The Knight’ – is the answer to that particular riddle.

Panini albums were now a cut above the rest and the securing of licenses from the English and Scottish Football Associations, as well as the respective players’ associations, gave them an official seal of approval. Within a few years, all the competition had been removed from newsagents’ shelves – it was a landslide victory for Panini.

By the 1980s it wasn’t just in the UK where Panini was ruling the roost. A first subsidiary was set up in Belgium, where Football 1972–73 was its debut album dedicated to the round-ball game (there had previously been a Panini cycling series there).

It was truly the best of times for Panini as their World Cup albums – especially Mexico 86 – helped to spread the Panini gospel around the globe.

In 1988, the Panini brothers sold the company to British media mogul Robert Maxwell, before partworks publishers DeAgostini Publishing Group, in collaboration with Bain Gallo Cuneo Capital Investments, took over in the early 1990s, following the death of Maxwell. Marvel Entertainment Group Inc. bought the Panini Group in July 1994, before it returned to Italian hands with Vittorio Merloni’s Fineldo SpA in the late ’90s.

The mid-2000s saw Panini regain former glories, and achieve even greater heights. Panini’s Germany 2006 album restored the ‘show stopper’ album to its rightful place as the starting point for many in preparing for that year’s World Cup. Panini America opened in 2009, building the brand almost from scratch in North America to become the leading collectables business in the region within a decade.

South America’s love affair with Panini continues to gather pace with the factory just outside São Paulo working overtime to produce record-breaking albums, up to now peaking with Brasil 2014. Panini Women’s World Cup and Euro albums started up in 2011 and go from strength to strength.

From an England perspective, the securing of the Premier League license for the first time for the 2019–20 season was welcomed by young collectors as well as those who were part of the first British wave in the 1970s and ’80s.

It is thought that, on average, over the last few seasons, Panini has produced one billion packets a year. That equals six billion stickers!

The purpose-built Panini factory in Modena – sticker heaven for any collector.

Today the Panini Group has subsidiaries throughout Europe, Latin America and the United States.

Panini is the International brand leader within the world of sticker and trading card collectables with over 1,000 collection launches each year and one of the leading publishers of children’s magazines and books, comics, manga and graphic novels, in Europe and Latin America with over 7,000 publications yearly.

Panini employs a staff of over 1,200. One hundred and fifty territories are regularly actively engaged with Panini’s physical products throughout every part of the World.

For all the mind-blowing sales figures and profit margins attached to the Panini brand, the real bottom line will always be the child-like glee felt by big and little kids when the name is mentioned or spied on a shopping trip.

Panini – long may you reign.

MEXICO 70

Pelé and Brazil lit up the first World Cup to be broadcast in glorious technicolour, while Panini brought their own brand of publishing magic to the table.

After nearly a decade of making a name for themselves in their native Italy with the domestic football Calciatori albums, Panini now started thinking bigger. After all, if they could win the affection of football fans in Italy, why not also look further afield to other countries? They figured the best way to do this was through the biggest football event on the planet, the FIFA World Cup.

Mexico 70 can be viewed as a soft launch because while the Italian album was heavily marketed and distributed, the International version (mostly available in West Germany, France and Spain, pictured on here) and the UK edition were much scarcer.

Adhesive football stickers (with peel-off backing paper) were still in their infancy so Mexico 70 was mostly made up of cards, with only a selection of stickers for first-page tournament logos and branding (including mascot Juanito, the little boy dressed in a sombrero and Mexico kit); official posters for previous World Cups; and national flags and football association emblems for each team in the finals. Players’ pictures – 11 to 14 per team – and team group shots were all printed on card.

The Italian edition of Mexico 70 has strong Panini branding – ‘the knight’ is seen wielding his trusty lance on the front cover – while the increasingly prominent bicycle-kicking exponent takes aim at a supersized football.

There were no Panini markings on the International or UK covers. Instead there was a map of Mexico with the host cities pinpointed, and a football imprinted with iconography from the Mexican flag. On the back was a pre-printed series of stamps issued for previous World Cups.

As attractive as the album and sticker packets might have looked to would-be collectors in the UK, few ever got to see them as distribution was limited.

MEXICO 70 ALBUM FACTS

PAGES: 48

ALBUM PRICE: 2 SHILLINGS

NUMBER OF STICKERS/CARDS: 288

PACKET COST: 2d FOR THREE STICKERS/CARDS

The Mexico World Cup saw reigning world champions England drawn to play 1958 and 1962 winners Brazil in Group 3, with their clash in Guadalajara likely to decide which team topped the group. Despite one of the greatest saves of all time by Gordon Banks – seen with a wispy moustache and yellow jersey in Mexico 70 – to deny Pelé and that tackle by Bobby Moore, Jairzinho scored the only goal around the hour mark.

That meant Brazil earned the right to face Peru in the quarter-final while England had a re-run of the 1966 final against West Germany.

Peru had finished runners-up in Group 4 thanks to victories in their first two games. Teófilo Cubillas, a red sash running across his otherwise all-white shirt in Mexico 70,