We’ve all seen movies and TV shows about robbers. Guys jump out of a van with ski masks (or Halloween masks of former presidents), announce their intentions and have some employee empty out the register or safe.
If you pitched that movie to an executive, they’d be asleep before the main characters even got out of the van.
But, let’s introduce a separate scenario:
We start with an aerial shot of the bustling, tree-lined streets of Munro, Argentina, outside of central Buenos Aires. Suddenly, we cut to armed men pushing their way into a business and yelling their demands at the employees.
“Give us all the stickers!” they shout. The employees’ faces shift from panic to confusion.
Not the ending you were expecting? Seems a bit too strange to be believable? Well, it happened. Local police reported that the armed men went into the printing business and took about $360,000 worth of Panini World Cup stickers. (Think baseball cards.)
My Panini sticker album collection. Each completed European Championship and World Cup album from 1990 to the present day comes with an unopened packet of stickers. 1990 was the first tournament I ever watched @OfficialPanini #gotgotneed pic.twitter.com/GpT4LCLIPi
— Keith (@krobbo81) June 2, 2018
Each box contained about 1,000 packets of stickers, worth about 60 cents each, per DW.
Local officials said that the business’ security cameras were unable to get a clear view of the robbers’ faces, and they are still at large.
Now, what they’ll do with the stickers remains to be seen. The most logical assumption would be that they sell them illegally. As the tournament gets closer (it starts on June 14), the cards’ value can rise.
Otherwise, police would be wise to scour local homes with new, face-laden wallpaper.
