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Originally Posted by Howie_16
Interesting. Could you explain why these particular teams have an exception?
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In Leverkusen and Wolfsburg's case, both were formed as factory teams with pharmaceutical giant Bayer owning Leverkusen and Volkswagon owning Wolfsburg. Thus they were given an exception.
For Hoffenhem, they were a small club from a 3,000 person village until they were backed by Dietmar Hopp, the co-founder of SAP. Hopp was a youth player with Hoffenheim before making his fortune at which point he came back, bought shares in the club in 2000 and brought them up through the ranks. Although he only technically owns 49% of the club, which is allowed, it is rumoured that he owns much more. Thanks to him, the club was able to bring in better players, improve facilities and build a new stadium. However the stadium itself is not in Hoffenheim but Sinsheim which is a bigger town near Hoffenheim.
RB Leipzig was formed in 2009 by Red Bull who bought a 5th division licence off another team. They have been promoted a few times over the past five years, including last year when they were promoted to the 2.Bundesliga. However they were denied entrance until they changed certain aspects of the club. First teams in Germany are not allowed a sponsors name in the club or badge of the team. And also they had to comply with the 50+1 rule. Currently RB Leipzig only has 9 members all employees of Red Bull. They changed the logo slightly and have found some loopholes in the 50+1 rule and thus are allowed to compete.
I would say though, the most hated clubs in Germany would be these four teams as they are all looked down on.