Macron joke site’s making money for homeless

T-shirts making fun of the Elysée Palace souvenir shop have raised €30,000 for homeless and migrant charities as they parody some of President Macron’s outspoken comments.

Connexion journalist Connexion journalist

Published Wednesday 21 November 2018 - 16:27 Modified Wednesday 21 November 2018 - 16:27

The €20 T-shirts, mugs and bags on the enlyseeboutique.fr site ape the boutique.elysee.fr site which sells watches at €149 and T-shirts at €55.

Enlysée Boutique spokesman “Manu” said: “We could not believe the Elysée had set up a shop; we thought it was a joke... so we decided to have some real fun and set up our own shop.

“So far, it has exceeded hopes and we have set a new target of €50,000 to help the gens de la rue. We have had 5,000 orders and our new Christmas packs should help us on the way.”

He said they would be delighted if Mr Macron could “speak out some more” to help sales.

The parody site, based in Calais, handed €10,000 cheques to each of three migrant and homeless charities in November. It is run by 15 volunteers and their festive season packs take aim at two government policies, with the €50 pack targeting the RSA poverty benefit and the €100 pack the ISF property wealth tax. Both offer a choice of T-shirts, sweatshirts, bags, mugs and beanie hats.

However, their takings are dwarfed by the official Elysée shop, which sold €350,000 of products in three days after opening, with profits used to fund palace restoration work.