Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

Dole asks the Pope to exonerate “forbidden fruit”

Dole Sunshine Company, the juice and fruit company, pulled off a risky as hell stunt that has garnered a ton of media attention. 

In early July, the company wrote an open letter directly to Pope Francis, the head of the Catholic Church, to make the “forbidden fruit” no longer forbidden claiming that NO FRUIT should be forbidden. 

The letter seeks to exonerate Adam for getting in major trouble for biting the apple some 4,000 years ago, and this campaign hopes to remove the association of the original sin with the “original snack”. The appeal asks the Pope to reverse what it called “the biggest PR disaster fruit has ever faced” and it even makes edits to the bible, replacing the word fruit with sins that are much worse for you  - like alcohol and tobacco. 

This is all an attempt for Dole to further its message.., to start a new global narrative that focuses on its benefits, and creates new, healthier eating habits that are consistent with our purpose to bring good nutrition to all.” The open letter said that if the Pope wouldn’t agree to rewrite the religious text, they would accept a message of support about the absolution of the fruit from the Vatican. 

This is hilarious and really a great stunt. 

Subway Free Sandwiches For Life

Subway is back in the spotlight with a little PR stunt of its own. On July 21, Subway announced a new contest where nine super Subway fans can get a Subway tattoo in order to get free sandwiches for life. Interesting, right? There are a few rules… this stunt is part of a block party Subway is throwing at Las Vegas parlor Bad Apple Tattoo to celebrate the chain’s new menu. During the event, nine super fans can opt to get a real tattoo Subway has designed from tattoo article DJ Tambe…apparently he’s a big deal in the tattoo world. These fans can’t get any tattoo that symbolizes Subway - no 6ft foot-longs allowed. Instead, they have to get this specific baseball jersey themed Subway Series logo tattooed on them. The size and the placement of each person’s tattoo will dictate how long the term is for them to get free sandwiches. 

Basically: A 2-inch square tattoo gets you free subs for a month, and a 3-inch square tattoo on a person’s shoulder blade, forearm or calf nets them free subs for a year. In order to get subs for life, participants must get a tattoo Subway calls "The Footlong," a 12- by 12-inch tattoo to be permanently inked onto their sternum or back. 

Subway will offer nine tattoos during the six-hour event while supplies last and said it’ll only give away one Footlong tattoo to the first brave soul who agrees to get it. Subway also said that eligible adults who are 21 or over can claim the remaining eight tattoos on a first-come, first-served and walk-in only basis. 

Way too many weird details and strings - I got hooked with the headline but then the fact that you can only get the tattoo at this one party in Las Vegas that’s at a Tattoo Parlor? I’m super confused. It did get a ton of press though. 

Leafly jumps on Stranger Things week brand placement with stunt: 

We all know that Stranger Things is EVERYWHERE these days. The Netflix show has taken over pop culture in a big way. And one thing that fans are loving is the 80s nostalgia of all the iconic brands that have been planted in the show…. They have shown things like Eggo Waffles, Polaroid Cameras, Wall Phones, KFC, LazyBoy Recliners, Reeses Peices & 3 Muskateers and more. But fans saw something new in this season….a cannabis brand called Purple Palm Tree Delight. And of course, this show is all the rage so fans were curious about this brand and if it really existed and how they could get it. 

This brand: Purple Palm Tree Delight, is credited in this seasons with calming a few key characters during some particularly stressful situations, has had some significant face time in the fourth and latest season.

And Leafly, the leading destination to learn about, find, and order cannabis, jumped in and created an entire fake product and product origin story on its platform within 48 hours of the episode airing. Leafly has no formal partnership or connection to the show, but it saw this opportunity and jumped on it fast. They looked at analytics of their site and saw that people were searching the Leafly database for Purple Palm Tree Delight and nothing was coming up in searches. So, Leafly created a strain out of thin air. The made up story about the made up product The indica-dominant hybrid, which lives only via this project, now has a Soviet-tinged backstory with references to CIA mind manipulation. Check out this graphic lex.

The description on Leafly, as well as posts on its social media channels, is full of Stranger Things related Easter eggs, which is super fun for fans of course and gets people talking and sharing all over social media. Execs say they were super careful with this, avoiding all of the show’s branding to ensure they didn’t cross any lines with trademarks. They also said this campaign was so fun because so many Leafly employees are huge Stranger Things fans, so it was great for internal morale. 

Leafly was SO SMART HERE. They got a ton of attention around this and really created something fun for Leafly users and Stranger Things fans. Leafly built out a full landing page for the fictional product and while it clearly states that it is fake, it does make some recommendations of REAL strains that could be similar. Leafly says it has a big goal to help push the $30 billion cannabis industry further into the mainstream and hopes to continue to destigmatize and normalize cannais use. I LOVE THIS SO MUCH. 

OK this next one technically occurred in June 2022 but to be fair I JUST saw it, so we’re calling it July:

Heineken: The Closer

Heineken pulled a stunt that helped with those of us struggling with the work-life blur that had occurred during the pandemic. Many of us work from home at least partially, and that really makes it tough to “turn off” work mode when it’s time for family/personal time. Obviously this is critical for self-care and just to be your best self - you can’t work ALL THE TIME. There are lots of pain points with this new normal. And Heineken has created a solution to (some) of our problems.

Heineken launched a campaign around a new product it called The Closer. Here’s a pic:

The Closer is a Bluetooth-enabled device that closes work applications when users crack open a beer. Beyond the device itself — which you could only snag during a one-hour window — the campaign included a a short, hilarious film with comedian Billy Eichner.  The video goes through all these scenarios where people ar caught working late and missing fun, or at the bar with their computer trying to multitask with a fake virtual background while getting yelled at by their boss. The open a Heinken with the closer and their wifi goes out, their apps shut down, automatically. 

AND they have a whole interactive website around this that is so much fun to interact with, and they have a contest where you schedule a meeting and invite up to 3 friends. Once you schedule your meeting, you’ll be entered into the grand prize drawing for a Closer Device and a lifetime supply of free Heineken. 

This is a great stunt. It shows that Heineken gets their white-collar working customer base and the problems they are currently facing. It’s cute, but it also feels relatively high end. And, they got a TON of media play around this not to mention the social media interaction. 

Plant-based meat brand offers customers chance to ‘grow’ their own sausages

Swedish based Plant-based meat brand, Peas of Heaven, is asking people to exchange their homegrown peas for sausages. Stay with me. Their new campaign asks people to buy pea seeds from its online shop and then plant them. Once they’ve grown, people are urged to send these peas to Peas of Heaven in return for a homegrown sausage.

The grow-your-own-sausage kit consists of pea seeds, instructions and a bag for customers to send back their peas in. Customers can choose between chorizo, barbecue sausage or cabanossy varieties of sausage.

The campaign is running on social media. The company says they want to change people’s view on everyday food, what is consists of and how it’s produced. They say that great sausages can be made from peas, not meat, and that when customers grow their own peas (a process that takes about 50 days), they will get a better understanding and respect for the process behind plant based food. 

This one, I’m not so sure about Lex. I think it’d a stretch. I LOVED the headline because I was like what…grow my own sausage?! But then it gets confusing, I’m actually buying a kit to grow my own peas, then I send those to you for a plant based sausage? I think they could have done something better. And in looking at their Instagram, a post from over 2 weeks ago about this kit and the promo only has 88 likes and 3 comments - and one of them is from US. The first post about the promo from just over 3 weeks ago had 142 likes and has 9 comments…. lol. For a brand that has 17.2K followers…LAME. 

Pizza Pizza has a unique offer for customers who are sick of inflation and just want a good deal. 

They are offering a “fixed-rate pizza,” giving consumers the opportunity to lock in an XL four-topping pizza at $16.99 for up to a year, with no price increases. INTERESTING. We all know that brands are struggling to deal with raising inflation at at finding a way to balance still running a profitable business without raising prices too much for customers. This is a super creative solution. 

This campaign offers Canadians the opportunity to lock in this deal via a special website. Customers who are interested just hav to fill out a short questionnaire on the website—with questions like “Do you like pizza?” and “Do you dislike inflation?”—for pre-approval. 

The effort is an extension of another campaign that  Pizza Pizza has going on, called the "Everyone Deserves Pizza" campaign, which plays into the notion that everyone has the right to delicious pizzas that suit their tastes, price point, delivery method and location. The brand's VP of marketing said that Fixed-Rate Pizza is the perfect demonstration of our willingness to ensure everyone can have pizza, while staying true to our fun and accessible brand personality.”

Pabst: There are economy packs, and then there is what Pabst is marketing—an 1,844-pack. 

Pabst Blue Ribbon is always doing something a little crazy. In July, they launched a 1,844 can pack of beer that you could buy in stores - but there were only 250 packs available in total at $849.99 per pack…that’s $2.17 per can. The reason for 1844 cans? 1844 is the year of Pabst’s founding. On top of selling more cans of Pabst than one should ever consume, the brand was also giving away $1,844 every day in July to “help households that are feeling the pressure from cost of living increases” and it is giving away 1,844 gallons of gas 2 times - once in July and once in August. Those contests for the cash and gas can be entered online or by scanning a QR code at stores that carry PBR. To buy the giant case - good luck! Pabst is not super clear on where exactly the limited edition packs are and they recommend that you can tell your local store you want to see one of the packs in their store, suggesting that not all the boxes have a home at the time of the release. 

This is interesting, but not unique enough. Pabst has done this a lot before. They produced 99-packs of PBR, and then they promoted truck bed sized packs of 1,776 beers. It’s not super original and that just makes it kind of boring. 

But to be fair, the Instagram post about this campaign from about a month ago has generated 50,618 likes and 1,353 comments when I last checked. So, it’s getting attention.

OK last one: 

‘World's Biggest Coconut' Stunt Brings Giant Inflatable Fruit and Icy Drinks to Parched Texans

Vita Coco always pulls off some creative stunts, and the one from July is pretty BIG. Literally. Vita Coco launched a “colossal coconut pop up” stocked with icy cold beverages in the middle of a triple-digital Texas heat wave. Perfect timing. This stunt features a 3-story tall, inflatable coconut, and they are calling it the world’s biggest. This stunt kicked off on Friday, July 22 and ran through that weekend. And it works well in Texas because we all know, EVERYTHING is bigger in Texas, right? It also brings some nostalgia in, playing off our love for those weird and wacky American roadsdie attractions. You wouldn’t be surprised to see a billboard for the world’s largest coconut somewhere in remote Texas, would you?

The main purpose of the stunt is to debut the brand’s first entrance into the juice category. In addition to the giant coconut balloon, the weekend program features local food vendors, family-friendly games, photo ops, merchandise giveaways and plenty of well-chilled Vita Coco drinks. They got a local Dallas TV personalityand fitness enthusiast involved, and they also partnered with creators Daisy Marquez and Keauno Perez.

Listen Now:

Resources:

https://www.thedrum.com/news/2022/07/05/dole-asks-pope-reclassify-forbidden-fruit-the-humble-apple 

https://www.today.com/food/restaurants/subway-footlong-tattoo-free-sandwiches-for-life-rcna39899

https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/a-strain-ger-thing-potent-weed-from-hit-show-appears-on-leafly-but-is-it-real/

https://www.thedrum.com/news/2022/07/05/plant-based-meat-brand-offers-customers-chance-grow-their-own-sausages

https://adage.com/article/marketing-news-strategy/fixed-rate-pizza-canadian-chain-tackles-inflation-new-campaign/2423736

https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/worlds-biggest-coconut-stunt-brings-giant-inflatable-fruit-and-icy-drinks-to-parched-texans/

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

Would you ever go on a vacation and stay inside of giant potato? Specifically, a private, 6-ton Idaho potato?  Well you can, should you so desire. This potato “hotel” is surrounded by 400 acres of farm land, so you’ll really feel like you’re living the authentic Idaho potato experience. The inside of the rental is temperature-controlled and even comes with a fireplace. There’s also a queen bed, a mini-fridge, power outlets and a record player.

And so no, it’s not a real actual potato, but a replica of the giant veggie. It has a bathroom, a soaking tub that you can lay in while star gazing. The giant potato can only fit 2 people, but really - how romantic? And really, there is nothing I love more than a giant baked potato slathered in butter so why not stay in one? Well thanks to Airbnb, you can… and for just $200 bucks a night. SIGN ME UP. And you can stay in so many other crazy places too - the potato is just the tip of the iceberg. And Lex, the listing for this potato hotel has generated hundreds upon hundreds of media placements all touting the unique properties of the spud and of course, talking all about Airbnb. 

Today, I wanted to tell you more about how Airbnb relies on PR stunts and creative marketing activations as its primary form of marketing. It’s rare that we see brands do this - often, they might pull a stunt as a one off, but Airbnb has them ongoing, ALL THE DAMN TIME. Some get more traction than others, but smartly, they are constnatly innovating and getting creative, and even smarter - they leverage other big brands as partnerships and position these stunts in a way that get coverage for Airbnb AND the partner brand. These partnerships are cosntatnly elevating the Airbnb’s brand equity and exposing the brand to new audiences. 

And besides being a super effective way to generate millions upon millions of dollars of press coverage, this strategy also is very inexpensive when you really think about it. So lets get into it. 

Airbnb was born in 2007 when two Hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to 4 million Hosts who have welcomed more than 1 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, Hosts offer unique stays and one-of-a-kind activities that make it possible for guests to experience the world in a more authentic, connected way.

After moving to San Francisco in October 2007, roommates and former schoolmates Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia came up with the idea of putting an air mattress in their living room and turning it into a bed and breakfast of sorts. In February 2008, Nathan Blecharczyk, Chesky's former roommate, joined as the Chief Technology Officer and the third co-founder of the new venture, which they named AirBed & Breakfast.^[10][12] They put together a website that offered short-term living quarters and breakfast for those who were unable to book a hotel in the saturated market.^[10] The site Airbedandbreakfast.com officially launched on August 11, 2008. Airbnb has roughly 5.6 million active listings in 220 countries, and 60% of its users are millennials.

But now, let’s get back to the potato, and that’s where we’ll start with Airbnb’s stunts.

Right now, Airbnb has a campaign going on called the $10 Million OMG Fund. Have you heard of this one Lex? Well by the time this podcast actually comes out, applications will just be closing. But currently, Airbnb is on the hunt for the world’s craziest spaces — and will help foot the bill to build them. Whether it’s the next boot, UFO house, or giant potato like we talked about, the $10,000,000 OMG! Fund is seeking ideas from existing and aspiring designers, architects, DIYers, and makers from around the globe. The fund’s $10 million will help finance 100 of the craziest ideas, giving 100 people an opportunity to turn them into actual Airbnb OMG! Category listings, which are Airbnb’s collection of the most unique homes.

Now anyone with a super wacky idea can submit an application at airbnb.com/omgfund. One hundred people with the 100 craziest ideas will receive US$100,000 each to make their creations possible (which really, that doesn’t seem like enough money but maybe???) and, ultimately, bookable. Ideas will be judged by an expert panel for their originality, feasibility, the experience the space will provide guests, and sustainability.  

The reason Airbnb launched this? They say it was created as a part of a growing trend of flexible living that has emerged in the past two years, where guests are now craving more creative, wacky and unexpected spaces that become the destination themselves. But really, this is a freaking smart way to launch what they have named Airbnb Categories… a new way to search for weird rentals. Airbnb Categories launched just this past May and features more than 30,000 unique listings around the world…and the new OMG! Category showcases the craziest of all the listings…just like the Idaho Potato. 

Kristie Wolfe is the owner of the Airbnb Superhost who rents her Idaho Potato out ofr $200 per night. She said that when the Idaho Potato Commission retired a six-ton prop potato, she happily took it off their hands and spent $32K transforming it into an Airbnb. Now she’s killing it in the OMG! Category and she said she went from making $13 an hour in her job to making over $200K in less than 3 years from from her creative idea. Now, she’s been invited to be a judge for the $10M OMG? Fund, along with a few other creative individuals. 

And the contest, Lex, it has already generated SO MUCH DAMN PRESS for airbnb and it officially closes on July 22! You can’t not see in right now, every major media outlet has covered it… Forbes, Newsweek, Business Insider, the list goes on and on. And reports show that this brand new category that was just launched in May has been clicked more than 2.5 million times…..all due to this press! 

SO let’s dive into a few more of the partnership stunts that Airbnb has been a part of. They have built this platform that makes brands of all shapes and sizes want to partner with, and that’s insanely valuable to the Airbnb brand.

In 2016, Airbnb launched what they originally called Airbnb Trips. Instead of just asking people to share their homes, they asked regular people to share their own expertise via publicly offered “expereinces”...and Airbnb of course took a cut..20% to get be exact. Fast forward 2 years and Airbnb rebranded it to Airbnb Experiences and they did something fun to promote it. They partnered with Vice Media Group, which is known for its edgy style of journalism and content, and they decided to send 100 people on one of of four custom made tours in four places…South Africa, Paris, New York or Tokoyo. These tours were super unique. You could be emersed in the electronic music scene in Cape Town in South Africa, or you could be taken on a immersive tour of Tokyo’s LGBTQ culture, explore the underground vogue movement in NYC or my fave one…take a sex tour of Paris. The partnership was perfect because Vice reporters travel all over the world to find the craziest stories just like these experiences and Airbnb could provide accommodations for these things through hosts. This contest/promotion gained an insane amount of media attention and drove so much awareness around the newly rebranded Experiences. Then, during the pandemic, they launched virtual experiences and those took off like crazy and got all the press attention. This partnership with Vice helped both brands accelerate their message big time, and it paid off. 

Art Institute of Chicago, Leo Burnett & Airbnb

In 2016, Airbnb had a new listing, for Van Gogh’s bedroom. Van Gogh’s 1888 iconic painting was recreated and brought to life in Chicago, and you could rent the room for $10…and it was just the perfect size for 2 people. Within 1 week, the story was covered in over 100 countries. It was EVERYWHERE. And through that media coverage, it told the world that Van Gogh’s bedroom painting had come to the Art Institue of Chicago, so it promoted that exhibit, it promoted Airbnb, and the agency Leo Burnett even got lots of press and won awards for this campaign. They spent $31,000 to execute this campaign and they earned $6 million in press coverage! 200,000 visitors flocked into the Art Institue of Chicago for this exhibit because of the press, and that made it the highest attendant exhibit at the museum in 15 years. CRAZY. 

Disney+, Home Alone & Airbnb

In 2021, Airbnb partnered with Disney Plus to promote the brand new Home Alone franchise movie…Home Sweet Home Alone. And they did this by, you probably guessed it, inviting guests to book an experience for one day only at the Home Alone house in a Chicago superb. The listing claimed to be posted by Kevin McCallister’s big brother bully Buzz McCallister, and invited guests to get in touch with their inner 8-year old and indulge in all the antics that Kevin did in the ove…eating junkfood, watching rubbish, setting up booby traps and of course, slappng on aftershave and yelling in the mirror. 

Rather being a traditional booking, this was a contest where one lucky person with three friends would be able to get to stay in the residence on Dec. 12 for just $25. This promotion was covered, once again, but every media outlet you could dream up. New York Times, Rolling Stone, Deadline and EVERYONE ELSE. So the press coverage was great, but unfortunately, the movie was NOT. So Disney Plus, the new title and Airbnb got a ton of great coverage beecause everyone loved the nostalgia but the movie didn’t do so hot. 

Airbnb Lists the Entire Country of Sweden

In 2017, Airbnb partnered with Visit Sweden to list the entire country of Sweden on Airbrb.This one is so rad Lex. Because it wasn’t a BOOKING campaign, it was a BRANDING campaign. 

See, what they promoted is a law or morie principle they have in Sweden called “freedeom to roam”. This gives people the right to freely explore all public spaces across the country. The idea is that people don’t NEED to book accommodation to visit the country, they can just grab a tent and freely access any of the publicly owned land. 

Visit Sweden was more interested in getting more travelers to perceive the country a place of rich, natural landscapes than they were in increasing the number of Airbnb bookings in the country. And the specifically wanted to attract more U.S. visitors. 

The listing read “it’s a home with all the necessities and amenities that any great home should have. It’s a place where you can eat berries from the ground, sleep under the stars, swim in lakes and roam freely.” The listing suggests specific locations for visitors to explore, but doesn’t actually allow you to BOOK any of those spacs since they are public. It says the country is available 365 days a year, accmodates everyone, had unlimited beds and check in of “whenever.”

So basically how it worked is this the listing for the entire country was promoted, and it was covered once again but ALL the best media outlets. That drove traffic to the listing and then people could check out the already 13,000 Airbnb listings in the country of Sweden that were already available to book on the platform… there was a special microsite just for this campaign and of course, a huge social media campaign.

And the results were pretty insane. The campaign more than doubled the searches about Airbnb in Sweden. Comparing year over year, if we look at May 2017 when the campaign launched to September 2017, and we compared that to the same months in 2016, searches increased by 146%. Then in 2019, a study was done about the economic impact of Airbnb on Sweden and get these numbers…travel on Airbnb in Sweden generated an estimated direct economic impact of more than $380 million in 2018 alone….or just over $1 million per day that year. That was made up of $296 million of guest spending and $86 million of host earnings. 

And this was clearly great for Airbnb too, as it was heavily focused on being more than a booking site at this time, it was playing in experiences and the press coverage that Airbnb got made that all worth it. Plus, since Airbnb couldn’t really generate $$ from bookings on this specific campaign, I am confident they charged a partnership fee that generated revenue, although that isn’t listed anywhere that I can find. 

Airbnb is the ideal example of how to utilize partnerships and PR stunts to drive insane awareness and revenue. In 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic that nearly killed travel, Airbnb had a valuation of $86.5 billion at the time it went public, selling at $146 per share on opening day. Just 12 years after it was started in a San Francisco apartment. 

Listen Now:

Resources:

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

https://www.businessinsider.com/sweden-lists-entire-country-on-airbnb-2017-5

https://news.airbnb.com/airbnb-reached-estimated-direct-economic-impact-of-e380-million-in-sweden/

https://skift.com/2017/05/23/airbnbs-latest-role-is-destination-marketing-for-sweden/

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/transcendent-marketing-stunt-van-goghs-airbnb-listing-jennifer-dopazo/

https://www.thedrum.com/news/2017/05/22/airbnb-stunt-lists-entire-country-sweden

Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

Do you know anything about the story of how the Gerber Baby search happened? This PR stunt is definitely one of the OGs. 

It starts in 1928 with a company that was at the time called the Fremont Canning Company. At that time, Dan Gerber was working for his father’s canning company in Michigan and had worked his way up to assistant general manager. He was married and he and his wife, Dororthy struggled big time with their new baby Sally who was very unhealthy. Their doctor suggested that they start feeding the baby strained foods. Dorothy, who was clearly a badass boss babe, suggested that her hubby persuade his father to start making and selling strained baby foods at the Fremont Canning Company.

Actually, I’d be lying if I said it was really THAT easy. The real story goes that for months, Dororthy prepared her own baby food at home to follow the doctors order, by peeling, steaming, scraping and straining - and eventually she was like THIS IS CRAZY. My husbands family owns a LITERAL canning factory and I’m here doing this shit? She didn’t know a ton about his job, but she figured if Fremont Canning Company could make tomato puree for adults in cans, why not pureed food for infants?? 

At first, Dan kind of blew it off. But then one day, Dan was home watching Dorothy on the struggle bus attempting to force peas through a strainer and there were peas flying all over the kitchen. He realized it was time to give her idea serious consideration. Typical 🙂 

Dan brought the idea to his dad, and he was on board. The first thing they did was prepare test packs for Dan’s baby girl… and suddenly many of the employees of the cannery were asking about it for their babies. 

Dan and his father did a ton of research into this new line of business and really, this concept was relatively new at the time. The only way you could get strained baby foods at that time was at a pharmacy and you had to have a prescription for it and it cost about 35 cents a can. That was a ton then…. That would be $5.64 today, for one can. Dan and his dad wanted to cut that price in half, to make strained baby food affordable for almost everyone. 

 They contacted nutritional experts to make sure they got it right and they tested the products through giving out tons of samples and doing all kinds of market research. They wanted to make sure they got it RIGHT. You can’t be too careful when it comes to babies. 

When they launched, they started with strained pease and four other strained foods, specifically prepared for babies. But when it came to marketing, they knew they had to do something to stand out and build trust for its brand, because it was going to be tricky to break through the long-held American traditional that babies were only given a 100% liquid diet until they were a full year old… they were concerned that moms wouldn’t buy it because they might be afraid to try something new. 

So Dan decided to make a bold move and spend some big money in a super strategic advertising campaign to launch the baby food: he bought spots in Good Housekeeping, Parents Magazine and a few others and he set out on a task to convince parents to adopt this new feeding concept and he used his personal story… how he was trying this himself with his sick daughter Sally. Kind of a pull-at-the-hearstrings, parent-to-parents message. 

But before the ads ran, he realized the brand and the packaging was still missing SOMETHING. He needed to really capture the attention of moms, he needed them to know that this new baby food was the perfect healthy new option for THEIR child. So Dan had an idea…or so its reported that it was Dan’s idea, any bets it was actually his genius wife??!!

So, he launched a contest. That contest was a call for a baby face that would best represent the new baby food. The company put out a call to artists, asking them to submit entries to feature on the label of their new product: baby food. They quickly received submissions, some were fancy oil paintings and others were sketches. They ended up choosing what appeared to be an unfinished charcoal sketch as the winner. 

The winning artist was Dorothy Hope Smith. Dorothy was the neighbor of a woman named Leslie Turner who had a cute baby girl named Ann Turner Cook. They all lived in Westport, Connecticut at the time. Ann was born in 1926 so she was 2 at the time that contest began, but Dorthoy had sketched that Ann when she was just 4 months old. That was the sketch she mailed in to the contest. 

The first ads that ran launching the baby food and the Gerber Baby also featured a coupon offering mothers six cans of the new baby food for one dollar. Just days after the first ad appeared, dollar bills literally began pouring into the Fremont Canning Company. 

Within six months, the baby food was on store shelve in most major markets in the United States. His dad was SHOCKED when the after the first year, gross sales of the new baby food were $345,000. Do you know how much that would equate to today? $5,624,952.63. 

And because sales were doing SO well, even the Great Depression which happened right after the launch of Gerber Baby Food didn’t slow the brand’s growth. It expanded its baby food lines during the 1930s, and suddenly by 1941 the Fremont Canning Company was selling more baby food than adult food and Gerber and his father officially changed the name to Gerber Products Company and sold the product worldwide.

The Gerber Baby logo was trademarked in 1931 and the original sketch sits safely at their corporate headquarters still today. It has become the essence of who Gerber is as a company. One Gerber exec was quoted saying “It is the epitome of a happy, healthy baby and the symbol of trust we have with parents. It’s everything to our company.”

Actually, in 1938 Gerber hired 10-year old Sally Gerber, the sick baby who was the inspo for the food, to answer every letter that customers wrote in! She did this for YEARS and eventually ended up becoming SVP for Gerber when she was older. SUCH a smart tactic….they basically illustrated that Sally was healthy and happy since starting on Gerber Baby Food as a young child. 

And as I mentioned at the top of the episode, Gerber kept the identity of the real Gerber Baby a secret for 40 years. During that time, the public would often guess who the Gerber Baby is and this caused a ton of organic conversation about the brand. A poll was taken across the United States that got people really talking….some speculated that it was actor Humphrey Bogart, and some thought it might be senator Bob Dole. Others thought actress Elizabeth Taylor was the big-eyed babe or a young Jane Seymour. This caused even more insane brand awareness for Gerber.

There was a very specific reason that Gerber never identified the baby’s identity because if the baby was identified as a girl or a boy, they felt they would alienate half the population. They wanted every mom to see the Gerber Baby a their child, so it was to remain genderless. 

The actual Gerber Baby, Ann Cook, knew she was the iconic baby on the jars since she was about 3, but she just kept it to herself. She lived a totally normal life…she got married, she became a teacher. But in the 1951 when she was in her 20s, almost 30 she was compensated from Gerber for the very first time - because another person came forward claimnig to be the Gerber Baby. She never received royalties (whichi would have made her insanely rich), but she earned about $5,000 and she was able to buy her first car and to make a downpayment on her first very modest home…which she said was amazing. She and her husband were barely making ends meet prior to that. 

Gerber finally revealed her identity in 1978.

Fun fact, she went on to become a novelist and wrote mysteries. She admitted that when she did use the Gerber Baby notoriety when anouoncing new books and doing signings because she would sell 10X more and everyone was intrigued. She was smart! Ann had a great, long life and died just THIS year in 2022 at the age of 95. When she passed away there were thousands of articles chronicling her life as the Gerber Baby. Which was so cool for her family, but also was a huge benefit to the Gerber brand. 

In 2010, Gerber marketing execs saw an opportunity to reignite a new search for The Gerber Baby. This time, the baby wouldn’t replace the iconic sketched face on the packages, but would instead become an annual search for The Gerber Generation, a new marketing campaign. The winner of this first year’s search would earn $25,000 and would be featured in the brand’s advertising. Eventually, a toddler named Mercy Townsend was chosen. As of today in 2022, there has been a search for a new Gerber Baby every year and the prizes have varied, from $25k to $50K, from scholarships to cash. In 2018, Gerber made internaitonal headlines again for selecting the first Gerber Baby with Down Synrome. In 2020, it selected its first adopted baby, and this year in 2022, a cutie named Isa Slish was selected as the first baby to have a limb difference…she was born without a femur or a fibula in her right leg… she earned $25K and Gerber matched the prize with another $25K donation to the March of Dimes.

In case some of you listeners are thinking that your baby could be the next Gerber Baby, here’s the job requirements: Gerber looks for newborns through children up to age 4 with a playful smile that can light up a room. Parents are asked to share pictures and videos of their little ones smiling and giggling. Job responsibilities include: eating tasty baby food products, serving as the adorable face of the company and appearing on Gerber’s social media platforms and in marketing campaigns throughout the year. No corporate experience is required for the position of "Chief Growing Officer" and 2022 Gerber Spokesbaby, but they must come with a "belly full of giggles," have a passion for being the center of attention and demonstrate "an irresistibly fun and expressive personality."

Lex, what’s really brilliant about this campaign?  Gerber turns the contestant each year into a brand advocate, and through the entries they gather so much personal information that is used for future marketing proposed, product launches and more. They also create this level of virality through this campaign annual that builds cohesion and excitement in the parent community.  Every single year when Gerber announces its annual search, every major media outlet covers this campaign! Both when the search is announced and then when the winner is selected.

In 2007, Gerber was sold to Nestlé for $5.5 billion.Today, Gerber is recognized as the world’s largest baby food manufacturer with sales exceed one billion dollars and is also one of the most trusted brands in the world. The original line of 5 products created by Dan Gerber has grown to over 220 products, plus of course over 300 baby care items that Gerber now sells, too.

Listen Now:

Resources:

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

The Gerber Website: https://www.gerber.com/meet-the-gerber-baby 

Wikipedia: The Gerber Baby

https://www.thelist.com/110857/untold-truth-gerber-baby/

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/04/business/ann-turner-cook-gerber-baby-dead.html 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/gerber-baby-ann-turner-cook 195630467.html#:~:text=It%20is%20now%20one%20of,it%20was%20actress%20Elizabeth%20Taylor.

Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

Southwest has long been on my list to cover, but it was really hard to pick what direction to go but when I read about these two stunts fron early in Southwest’s history, I knew I had to cover them…. Because you’ll see that the reason Southwest is the arline it is today is because of these off-the-wall, creative stunts that founder Herb Kelleher pulled off. The culture of the airline internally and externally was born out of these stunts I’m going to cover. Very, very few brands successfully tie their purpose, vision and values in with their internal and external marketing as successfully and seamlessly as Southwest Airlines. 

Just so we’re all starting with the same knowledge: Southwest’s Purpose is to connect people to what’s important in their lives through friendly, reliable, low-cost air travel.

Their vision: to be the world’s most loved, most efficient, and most profitable airline.

And Lex, these campaigns and stunts so clearly fit right into that vision and the purpose! So let’s dive in. 

Pay Full Price, Get a Fifth

This stunt had a super smart strategy behind it. When Herb Kelleher decided to start his own airline in 1966 he knew he was going to be a major disruptor and a challenger. I mean right out of the gates, he faced years of legal battles to just launch his airline to be an intra-state airline serving Texas…flying in between Dallas, Houston and San Antonio. Right out of the gate, three airlines took legal action to prevent a new baby airline company from being born… they were obviously afraid of Herb’s vision…to cut prices to make airline travel affordable for commuter travelers who didn’t want all the frills, just a safe ride to their destination from city to city in Texas. But he won those battles and successfully began serving customers in 1971. 

But even though they won the fight, those established airlines were PISSED. Those three airlines were Braniff, Trans-Texas Airways and Continental Airlines.  So for a few years things were OK, and then in 1973 Southwest had three 737 jets and flew to those three Texas cities. Braniff was still extra pissed that Southwest even got off the ground at all, so they were determined to CRUSH Southwest financially. So, they dropped their prices as low as possible… so low that they were confident Southwest couldn’t even survive let alone compete. 

Braniff cut its prices in half, so the Dallas to San Antonio route went from $26 to $13. At this time, Southwest was averaging something like 17 passengers per flight so that math just couldn’t possibly keep their infant airline afloat. Do that math real quick….$13 times 17 passengers…that’s $221 per flight. Even in 1973 terms, that was not enough to keep Southwest afloat. Herb saw two options: match the price and lose money and hope for the best, or get creative. And you know what he chose Lex? He chose to get freaking creative!

Southwest matched the $13 price, BUT with a caveat. You could choose the deal fare, or you could pay full price…$26 and you would receive either a fifth of Chivas Regal Scotch or a fifth of Canadian sipping whiskey as a gift. And you know what Lex…this worked inanely well. Why? Because almost all of the travlers on Southwest were business travelers…business travelers (almost exclusive dudes) who were not personally paying for their flights…they were expensing them. So with that, of course they chose the higher fare because they got free liquor for them… on their company’s dime. 

This campaign worked! Passenger numbers increased to 75 per flight — about half of whom paid the full fare and added $40,000 revenue per month. It was so successful that Southwest became the biggest distributor of whiskey in Texas due to the number of gifts they were giving to customers.

Also, you may have noticed that Braniff no longer exists…it shut down in 1982. So that’s a HUGE win for Southwest.

Now, let’s hit for fast forward button to 1990. Southwest was crushing it. It had been almost 20 years since their first flight and they decided to launch a brand new slogan….Just Plane Smart. Get it? Plane, like PLANE. Cute. I love a good pun. There was a minor problem with this new tagline though. A small aviation sales and maintenance company, Stevens Aviation, had a tagline that was very similar…it was “Plane Smart” and they had been using it for years. Granted they werent technically in the same line of business exactly, but it was close enough. And, Stevens Aviation had trademarked their version of that tagline. So, a few months after Southwest launched their creative new tagline, Stevens Aviation got wind of this they didn’t go the typical route of calling lawyers, probably because they figured they wouldn’t win…Southwest was pretty big at this point. One senior exec took the problem into his own hands. He sent a letter directly to Herb and this is what it said:

Dear Mr. Kelleher:

We LOVE your new ads that use the clever, creative, effective "Plane Smart" theme! We can testify to its effectiveness since we've been using it in our own ads for a long time. In the true fun-loving spirit on which Southwest Airlines was founded, we challenge you to a duel to see who gets to keep "Plane Smart" — big ol' Southwest or little bitty Stevens. (Please — no lawyers!) We trust that you accept this challenge in the spirit intended. ... No litigiousness implied at all. We challenge you to a sleeves-up, best-two-out-of-three arm wrestling match between you and our chairman, at high noon on Monday, January 27, 1992...

Respectfully,

Stephen D. Townes

Executive Vice President

Stevens Aviation

P.S. Our chairman is a burly 38-year-old former weight lifter who can bench press a King Air — or something like that…

But if we’ve learned anything about Herb so far, he doesn’t ever take the typical route so how do you think he reacted, Lex? Well, before Stevens Aviation even got a response back, suddenly the CEO Kurt Herwald got a phone call from a journalist out of the blue about the proposed arm wrestling mach and Kurt got worried. So he called the Southwest offices directly and was shocked with the receptionist patched him right through to Herb. Kurt explained the proposed letter and that the media got wind of it, and Herb laughed and told Kurt that he had been the one to tip off the press. He LOVED the idea. And he agreed to it. He officially sent this letter back:

Dear Mr. Townes:

Our chairman can bench press a quart of Wild Turkey and five packs of cigarettes a day. He is also a fearsome competitor who resorts to kicking, biting, gouging, scratching, and hair pulling in order to win. When really pressed, he has also been known to beg, plead, whine, and sob piteously. Can your pusillanimous little wimp of a chairman stand up against the martial valor of our giant?

Best regards,

Herbert D. Kelleher

I had to look up pusillanimous, and it means timid. 

So now that this unique agreement was reached, Herb knew that this was a huge PR opportunity for Southwest and for his newfound frenemy and he promised Stevens Aviation that he was going to promote the HELL out of it so it would benefit both brands, no matter the result of the match. 

The match became known to the media as the Malice in Dallas, and the media ate up every minute of it. No one was surprised that Herb jumped on this - he was one of the most beloved, and wackiest CEOs that America had seen at the time…he was known as the kind of guy who would dress up as a Leprechan for St. Patricks’ Day, and he was always pushing the limits with out of the box ad campaigns.

Fans who were reading about the pending match in the newspaper and seeing it on TV sent him all kinds of gifts to get him ready for the battle…. Wheaties, spinach, Wild Turkey whiskey and someone even sent him anabolic steroids from Mexico. 

They smartly decided to make this a huge spectacle. Southwest chose the Dallas Sportatorium - an old wrestling venue - to hose the event because they were confident that could easily fill the 4,500 seats with Southwest employees alone! And the Southwest marketing team and Herb were SO SMART HERE, and really years ahead of their time. They actually produced a short faux documentary chronicling Herb training for the big match to get the public pumped up about it. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP7BBoAHdcc

This mockumentary is hilarious!! Herb is surrounded by an enthusiastic group of Southwest employees, including a class of brand new flight attednants. It shows him progressing from struggling with sit-ups and jumping jacks, to easily curling oversized bottles of Wild Turkey. IT’s SO FUNNY.

So on March 20, 1992, spectators packed the stadium. They saw a red-robed “Killer Kurt” Herwald in a polo shirt, slacks, and sunglasses strode into the ring followed by toothpick-twirling “Smokin’ Herb” Kelleher, clad in sweatband, white bathrobe, and black boots.  Taped on each boot was a pack of cigarettes, Southwest stickers, and an airline-sized bottle of whiskey. What a look!

Behind the scenes, Herb and Herwald completely choreographed the event as if they were staging a real wrestling match. But the result was totally pre-arranged.

When it was showtime, the crowd watches as Herb slowly rises from a recliner placed in his corner and locks his right hand with Herwald’s own. As the referee called for the competitors to place their left arms down, Herb’s face turned from supreme confidence to something approaching panic.  

Reaching frantically with his left hand, which still held a cigarette, we see Herb plead with the referee for a quick bathroom break. Herwald momentarily loosened his grip. He’d fallen right into Herb’s trap. As Herwald relaxed his arm, Herb put all of his strength into pinning Herwald’s arm before the referee could even react to the question.  

After leaping around the ring, pumping his fists in exalted victory, Herb was told his win was null and void, as he’d broken the rules. Herb, feigning shock, yelled at the referee: “I didn’t know there were any rules!”  

As their right hands clasped a second time, Herwald took an immediate lead, pulling Herb’s hand over the midline. For the next 20 seconds, they flexed and stretched—with, in Herb’s case, veins practically popping through his neck.  At one point, Herb appeared to bring Herwald’s arm back to the center, but it was merely a last-gasp push in a fight destined to go to the “better” man. Within seconds, Herb’s arm was pinned down hard, knuckles slammed to the table.  Herb lost!

Everyone was laughing and cheering! Both CEOs announced they’d be making donations to their respective charities in honor of a hard-fought match. 

Herb congratulated his opponent Herwald, who disclosed he was allowing Southwest to continue to use its Just Plane Smart slogan. Herb praised his opponent’s selflessness before calling for a stretcher to carry him from the arena. 

The whole thing was SO AMAZING. What a way to turn what could have been a horrific, ugly, expensive legal battle with no real winner into an amazing and fun PR stunt that made both companies look good, and got their employees SO pumped up along wth driving consuner awareness of both brands. 

And Lex, the media ate this whole thing up! In addition to local newspaper, radio, and TV coverage, NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw aired an extended segment shortly after the event. President George H. W. Bush wrote Herb an effusive note. And praise from Employees and Customers flooded into Southwest offices. Can you imagine that abundance of applications Southwest probably got after this? Who wouldn’t want to work for a CEO like that!

It’s estimated that Southwest earned as much as $6 million in publicity as a result of this. And Herwald himself said that the event boosted the name recognition of Stevens Aviation so much that the company enjoyed 25 percent annual growth for the next four years.

Today, his customized black “Malice” boots have been preserved and enshrined in an exhibit at Southwest Headquarters in Dallas. The coolest thing, in my opinion about this whole thing, is how Herb turned this into the perfect example of how he wanted Southwest’s employees to approach their work. Herb had the guts to cast aside his CEO status to make a crowd feel excited, to laugh, and that naturally gave Southwest employees the creative license to find their own unique ways to make customers feel loved and to entertain them. That’s a big part of why we see Southwest employees living that every time we fly - from the songs they sing on the intercoms on the plane, to the random trivia games they will play when flights are delayed at the gate. They have fun with it!

Listen Now:

Resources:

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

https://southwest50.com/our-stories/armed-and-dangerous-the-malice-in-dallas/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines

https://www.upworthy.com/in-the-90s-two-companies-were-using-the-same-motto-they-arm-wrestled-to-see-who-got-to-keep-it 

https://priceonomics.com/how-southwest-airlines-settled-a-legal-dispute/

https://www.inc.com/3-lasting-lessons-from-malice-in-dallas.html

Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

Domino’s started out small, with one store in Michigan in 1960. It was launched near a college campus. Fast forward more than 60 years, and Domino’s has grown to become one of the most recognized and leading pizza brands in the world. 

The Monaghan brothers started Dominos together but shortly after one of the brothers quit. Tom continued to truck forward and drive business. So, that first location was near a college campus and they couldn’t afford a big location for dining in. But Tom was super smart and said, no worries we will just have the kids come here for carryout or we will deliver. So, Dominos has been in the delivery business since its inception. 

In 2009, Dominos suffered a major blow when a series of five viral videos were uploaded to Youtube showing a male employee at a Domino's Pizza chain in North Carolina contaminating ingredients with his body while a female narrates that items with those ingredients will go out to customers. Immediately the media went crazy and people were rightfully disgusted and Dominos lost revenue and the brands stock was trading at less than $10 per share! But, CEO Patrick Doyle had a plan to turn it around.

Listen Now:

Resources:

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

https://www.thedrum.com/news/2022/01/13/domino-s-pizza-returns-with-yodeling-discounts

https://www.dominosweddingregistry.com/

https://bettermarketing.pub/how-dominos-revitalized-its-failing-brand-77e9dec19ac3

Welcome to Will It Stick? podcast, where hosts Melissa and Alexis cover creative advertising campaigns, PR stunts, and marketing activations that brands of all shapes and sizes pull, and dive into the research and data to understand if it worked and of course ... Will It Stick?

what is the ONLY beverage that both basketball players in the NBA and football players in the NFL can drink on the sidelines at game?

Gatorade. Gatorade shells out big bucks to the NBA and NFL and a number of other sports to be THE brand you see on the sidelines. Gatorade spends somewhere around $18 million per year for its NBA exclusive partnership alone. Many times, it’s really just water (or maybe something else?) inside those Gatorade water bottles as these days, many players have their own magical concoctions of things they like to drink. But, it always appears as Gatorade. 

Since it’s inception, Gatorade has been directly associated with sports. I mean - even its founding happening on the football field. It was summer 1965, and the Univeristy of Florida assistant football coach Dewayne Douglas had a problem that he needed to solve. Many of his players were “wilting” in the heat - they couldn’t handle it. He was also wondering why his players never needed to pee during games…. I mean it’s Florida. Hot and HUMID. He approached a group of scientists on the University campus and asked if they had an ideas about how he could replace the bodily fluids lost during physical exertion in the heat. The scientists, led by Dr. James Robert Cade, got to work. Cade figured that he could solve the problem by helping players replace those lost resources, so he stirred together some sodium, sugar and monopotassium phosphate with water to create a drink soon dubbed Gatorade, after the University of Florida’s nickname: the Gators. 

It was originally going to be called Gator-Aid, but there were a few problems with that….one being that the FDA had a rule that if you used the word “AID” you had to back up your medical claims…that was a lot of hoops and red tape. So they simply made it ‘ADE”. Also, they saw the commercial opportunities they had by not just directly trying it to the Gators, so they wanted to pay homage but not be named something specific). 

The drink they first created contained salts and sugars that could be absorbed more quickly, but in its early days it tasted AWFUL. In fact, many of the athletes would vomit after drinking it. 

I mean these were scientists making the drink, NOT foodies! They quickly added some lemon flavoring to make it more appealing and there was less puking happening after that. They ran informal trials on something like 10 players who drank this new concoction while the others did not, and apparently - it worked. Soon the whole team was on board. 

In 1967, Gatorade gained major credibility across the country when the Gators football team credited their first Orange Bowl win over the Georiga Tech Yellow Jackets to Gatorade. Yellow Jackets coach Bobby Dodd was famous asked about the teams’ loss and he was quoted saying ‘We didn’t have Gatorade. That made the difference.” That’s a pretty solid endorsement and immediately the drink gained popularity in the larger sports communty. Just a few years later in 1969, Gatorade entered into an agreement with Stokely-Van Camp, Inc., a canned food packaging company, with the U.S. rights to produce and sell Gatorade and that very same year, a licensing agreement made Gatorade the official sports drink of the NFL. 

You’ve heard of and seen the Gatorade shower, right? Actually originally it was called the Gatorade Dunk…do you know how it came to be? It actually started in the mid 80s, when Harry Carson and Jim Burt of the New York Giants doused head coach Bill Parcells during the 1985 season. It took off like wildfire after that and now we see it after almost every championship game. 

By 2015, royalities from Gatorade to the original founders, their familie and the University surpassed $1 billion.  Today, Gatorade dominates the U.S. sports drink category, holding a 72.1% market share of retail sales and is owned by Pepsi. But, before it was owned by Pepsi….it was purchased by Quaker Oats in 1983 for $220 million….they won it over bidding rival Pillsbury. 

There are a lot of angles we could cover when it comes to Gatorade… but the biggest, most iconic one IMO is the Be Like Mike campaign. In this episode we dive into how the campaign came to be and the results.

Listen Now:

Resources:

Follow Will It Stick on Instagram and check out our website.   

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/17246999/michael-jordan-famous-mike-gatorade-commercial-debuted-25-years-ago-monday

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Be_Like_Mike

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/17246999/michael-jordan-famous-mike-gatorade-commercial-debuted-25-years-ago-monday

Special thank you to Bob Roth of Cypress Homecare Solutions & host of Health Futures: Taking Stock in You.