Mars gets focused on re-uniting adults and regular football in England. The chocolate brand in partnership with The FA to launch a campaign entitled ‘FA MARS Just Play’ across the country to encourage its consumers to take a ball and head to the pitch with their friends to play a football mach like they did when they were kids. Through the new initiative, the brand is “aiming to get 150,000 new participants playing the game for at least 30 minutes a week by September 2013, and deliver a total of 3.9m hours of extra football played each year throughout England,” thefa reports.

Photo: The FA

According to Sport England’s research, today people in England are playing football less than before due to a lack of facilities, increased apathy, logistical difficulties that hamper entering the game and so on. The new initiative is kicked off to ruin the tendency and get people playing no matter what their gaming skills are by offering them simple solutions to most of these problems.

Mars and The FA will open over 100 Just Play centers to be running over the next 12 months across England. Each of them will be staffed by coordinators to provide enthusiasts with 800 Just Play sessions benefitting 50 participants at a time.

The campaign will be promoted via a humorous TV ad featuring England and Tottenham player Peter Crouch—the spot will be launched this week. The chocolate brand has spent £48 million on the sport’s promotion since 2006, when it launched its Believe initiative for the World Cup in Germany.

Fiona Dawson, President of Mars Chocolate UK, said, «We aim to make it easier for players of any standard to be able to get back into playing football. Our commitment will be tracked and measured to ensure that we meet the objectives we have set together in partnership.»