Bayern Munich and the Oktoberfest: Wiesn, Maß and Lederhosen

The football record champions are once again using the Munich Volksfest as a PR offensive this year. The team photos in traditional costumes only started in 1980.

Jerseys and lederhosen are exhibited in the House of Bavarian History Photo: Eberhard Thonfeld/imago

As August draws to a close, September is just around the corner and with it the Oktoberfest. That is what the calendar says. In Munich, there is hardly any other topic in the local media than the big folk festival. ts Find the Wiesnmadl 2024, and the Evening newspaper It can be seen that the colors of the dirndls this year “range from smoky blue tones to purple and red to shades of green like sage and olive.” FC Bayern Munich is also keeping up the pre-October traditions these days.

At the end of August, as tradition dictates, the Lederhosen photo shoot was on the calendar for the team's players and staff. The photo session, in which the players pose in FC Bayern's traditional clothing to advertise the club's beer partner, has long since become a tradition.

The shooting made headlines in the Munich press for several days. Who is toasting us and with what look? Why is Alphonso Davis looking into space? Has Kingsley Coman been positioned so far to the left so that he can be cut out as easily as possible, is he out of the club? And why is he toasting goalkeeping coach Michael Rechner, with whom he actually has nothing to do?

Football fans, who apparently value their commitment to Islam as much as their love of the sport, were overjoyed that Bayern's new signing Sacha Boey didn't have a beer in his hand. They celebrated him on social media when he scored a goal to bring the Champions League to Mecca.

He is not the first Muslim Bavarian to appear in a brewery advertisement without a beer glass in his hand. Bavaria's former favorite Frenchman, Franck Ribéry, also refrained from holding a wheat beer glass in front of the camera.

Dirndl carnival, but no obligation to drink beer

This is also being reported extensively in the Munich media, and one can only hope that one day it will not be considered a heroic act to go to a photo shoot for FC Bayern Munich without a beer. Anyone who heard the shouting of Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder during his beer tent appearance at Gillamoos early on Monday morning would not be surprised if consuming half a beer soon became part of the medical check at FC Bayern. “This is our country,” Söder said, “and our country must be shaped by us.” Well then, cheers!

It's not that time yet. And so a hearty “Raise your mugs!” will soon echo through the marquee where FC Bayern is making its traditional Oktoberfest visit. The club's new traditional costume collection will then be able to see the light of day, as has been the case since the 1980s. Before 1980, FC Bayern, like the whole of Munich, was largely free of traditional costumes.

Anyone who doesn't appreciate the Lederhosen and Dirndl carnival that Oktoberfest has become will describe the years before 1980 as the good old days. It is difficult to say exactly how much of the blame FC Bayern has for Munich's regression from a traditional city to a veritable folklore behemoth that always smells a little of tanned leather. However, hardly anyone would deny that the club has played its part in this.

In 1980, the players celebrated winning the German championship for the first time in lederhosen on the balcony of Munich's town hall. Since then, there has been no stopping them from wearing traditional costumes. Not at FC Bayern and not at the Oktoberfest either.