The 2026 FIFA World Cup may be over, but its cultural impact is still being felt across the globe. The tournament’s presence wasn’t just felt in stadiums. It showed up in backyards, bars, living rooms and everywhere else fans gathered to watch the U.S. Men’s National Team (USMNT) take the field.
That idea sits at the center of Jim Beam’s summer campaign, “Home Field Advantage,” which takes the idea of active fandom out of the stadium and into the streets, living rooms, and bars where fans watched the USMNT play.
Jim Beam built a series of fan-facing activations designed to encourage supporters to transform everyday spaces into displays of national team pride.
The campaign began at the brand’s Clermont, Kentucky distillery with a large-scale lawn-art message before moving to Chicago, where the masked artist Mr. Flower Fantastic unveiled a mobile floral tribute at Pioneer Court ahead of the USMNT’s send-off match.
I spoke with legendary USMNT goalkeeper Tim Howard and Mr. Flower Fantastic via Zoom during the early stages of the tournament to learn more about the campaign.
Support From A U.S. Soccer Legend
For Tim Howard, the campaign’s premise is rooted in something he knows from experience. The former U.S. goalkeeper has played in some of the loudest stadiums in the world. As the U.S. team was exposed to a whole new generation of fans, he knows that national-team energy doesn’t just come from ticket holders.
“We all want to go to a World Cup game, but we know not everyone can go,” Howard said. “They’re going to consume the game from somewhere else—backyard parties, house parties, bars, pubs—that’s where most of us are going to see the majority of the games.”
For Howard, that distributed fandom matters. The national team doesn’t just feel the crowd during the 90 minutes of play. They can feel the momentum building in the days leading up to a match.
“The energy is also from people in the streets, at the hotel and at watch parties, and the team feels it,” Howard said. “They’re going to hear this energy everywhere they travel. Jim Beam was tapping into that because there’s a cultural significance to football. There’s togetherness.”
That togetherness is especially important for a U.S. soccer culture that has matured significantly since the country last hosted the men’s World Cup in 1994. Old cliches about American fans not understanding the sport no longer apply the way they did 30 years ago. Howard sees a fan base that is larger, more invested and far more fluent in the game than ever before.
“Every fan that I talk to is passionate and knowledgeable. Fans today understand the game. They don’t let the team off the hook, but they also understand how difficult these games are," Howard added.
That balance is important. The U.S. entered the tournament as a host country with a growing domestic league, a generation of players competing across major clubs and a fan base that expects more. Howard said success will be measured by results.
“How far you advance will always be how success is measured,” he said. “If they can get to the round of 16 or quarterfinal, I think that’s success. But there are also moments. When you look back on the U.S. Men’s National Team in World Cups, they’ve always had magical moments.”
Like the previous three tournaments the team qualified for (2010, 2014, 2022), the USMNT reached the round of 16 in 2026. As Howard mentioned, this tournament had magical moments for the team, including two thrilling goals from striker Folarin Balogun.
These moments don’t happen in isolation, though. Howard describes soccer as an endurance sport where the crowd can provide a real physical and emotional lift.
“These guys have to run 14k,” Howard said. “It’s a lot of high intensity, and that lift from the crowd gives the team energy. It’s tangible when you have to run those hard yards and the fans are on their feet.”
The campaign placed itself within the rituals of American sports fandom: watch parties, backyard gatherings, pregame rituals and the whimsical belief that what happens away from the stadium can still affect what happens inside it. Howard thinks the connection is a natural one.
“Soccer is the world’s game, and U.S. Soccer brings the world’s game to America,” he said. “Bourbon is America’s drink, and Jim Beam is bridging those worlds with this campaign.”
Giving the USMNT Its Flowers
The Chicago chapter of the campaign gave that idea a physical form.
Mr. Flower Fantastic, the enigmatic floral artist known for bringing flowers into unexpected urban and cultural spaces, created a mobile installation designed to “give the USMNT their flowers” before the team’s send-off match. The piece featured yellow goldenrod, Kentucky’s official state flower, tying the activation back to Jim Beam’s home state.
At first, flowers and soccer might seem like an unusual pairing. That’s exactly what attracted MFF to the project.
“It’s one of those things that doesn’t seem like it makes all the sense in the world, but for some really beautiful reason, it totally does,” MFF said. “In a lot of ways, I feel as though we’re patriots. We want to champion and celebrate the home team.”
MFF’s work often depends on contrast. Flowers are fragile, temporary and traditionally associated with personal moments of celebration, sympathy or affection. Sports fandom, by contrast, is loud, public and intense. By placing a floral installation in the middle of Chicago and making it mobile, the project created a soft, yet highly visible talking piece.
“For me, it’s always about how can we place flowers in places where flowers aren’t expected to be,” MFF added. “It’s not supposed to be there, but it is. And because it is, it changes the space.”
That idea also shaped the decision to make the piece move through the city. Rather than asking fans to come to a fixed installation, MFF wanted the work to interrupt the rhythms of the day.
“Let’s make a float. Let’s make it mobile. Let’s celebrate this moment through the town,” he said. “As people are going to work or going to the game, we can happily disrupt that moment for a second and bring some beauty into the world.”
The use of Kentucky goldenrod gave the piece a connection to Jim Beam. Before building the installation, MFF and his team visited Kentucky to see the distillery and surrounding landscape.
“Whenever I do a project, if I can get as close to the seed as possible, that really starts my journey,” he said. “It was really important for my team and me to fly down to Kentucky and go down and really see the distillery and the landscape.”
He described floral art as a language, one capable of communicating “homegrown roots” in a way that fit naturally with the campaign’s theme.
The installation itself required nearly 60,000 blooms, and, as MFF noted, the work behind the scenes extends far beyond him. “There are a lot of heroes that go unnamed and unseen,” he said, acknowledging the farmers, logistics teams and many hands involved in bringing the piece to life.
It Takes All Of Us
That recognition of shared effort mirrors the broader message of the campaign. Home field advantage isn’t created by any one player or fan. It’s created collectively by people choosing to show up in whatever ways they can.
For Howard, that includes even the newest fans. “Players don’t differentiate whether you’re a new fan or a seasoned fan,” he said. “If you wear the jerseys, paint your face and yell and scream, the players don’t know one from the other. They just know that they’re well supported.”
Howard predicted that this tournament could convert domestic fans like never before.
“My generation brought some casual fans to the table, and this generation has more fans than ever before,” he said. “I really hope they harness that and bring more people into the fold.”
He was right. The 2026 World Cup was the most-watched tournament ever on both English- and Spanish-language U.S. television, with average audiences more than doubling from 2022 on Fox and Telemundo/Peacock. The final drew roughly 63 million to 66 million U.S. viewers, far surpassing the domestic audiences for the 2022, 2018 and 2014 men’s World Cup finals.
The World Cup was ultimately judged by what happened on the pitch, but the USMNT and the United States as a host nation changed the narrative: for both American fans and for the millions of international fans who traveled to the U.S. to support their national teams.
The world’s game was another reminder that sports have the power to unite us all, no matter where we call home.
Portions of this interview were edited for clarity.
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