Dieux du Stade

A former president of the NRJ Group, Dieux du Stade was one of several marketing initiatives by Guazzini aimed at promoting the club and changing the image of rugby as a sport; other tactics included introducing pink uniforms for Stade Français, and recruiting Madonna and Naomi Campbell to be official sponsors for the club.

[4][5] The photographer for each edition of Dieux du Stade varies; individuals who have shot the calendar include Steven Klein, Peter Lindbergh, Tony Duran, and François Rousseau.

Racing 92 attempted to have photographs of player Henry Chavancy removed from the 2012 edition of the calendar days before it was slated to be released, calling it a "slight on Racing's image" and claiming that Chavancy had not sought permission to participate from club management; the calendar was ultimately published without redactions.

[3][10] By 2019, annual sales for Dieux du Stade had fallen to 50,000 copies, a trend Libération attributed to a general decline in the popularity of physical calendars amid increasing digitization.

[1] Vanity Fair France speculated that the calendar's shift in the mid- to late 2010s towards glossy high fashion-styled photography also contributed to a decline in popularity, a trend the 2020 edition of the calendar attempted to reverse by incorporating a more naturalistic aesthetic.