Some celebrities around the country are symbols of envy after landing big endorsement deals from luxury brands.

Some celebrities around the country are symbols of envy after landing big endorsement deals from luxury brands.

Traditionally, cars, designer houses, beauty and fragrance brands have chosen to align themselves with celebrities. They know that ordinary people want to look like famous people. When they agree to endorsements, companies spend a fortune on their brand ambassadors.

Some of the South African celebrities who sport designer labels are DJ Monde with Dickies, Black Coffee and singer Zonke can be spotted in Puma gear. Thembi Seete proudly endorses Rage merchandise, while kwaito star Kabelo "Bouga luv" Mabalane is associated with sports brand Reebok and drives a sponsored Audi A4.

But not all celebrities are paid brand ambassadors. Instead, they spend money "endorsing" brands.

Maybe it's time that companies reviewed their endorsement strategies. Instead of spending millions of rands paying celebrities to endorse their products, they should just let soccer players do the job for them - free of charge. Soccer stars are heroes to scores of young people and if they see them wearing a certain label, they will run to the stores and buy it just to look like their heroes.

Soccer players are slaves to fashion labels. They always want to be seen in the latest designer gear. If you want to see the hottest clothes in any season, you just have to wait until the end of a soccer match when the players change from soccer to designer gear.

They wear some of the most expensive brands and drive some of the fanciest cars around.

These days consumers are smarter and therefore companies have to choose wisely and strategically when deciding on who their brand ambassadors should be.