Victory Fridges in Cleveland, Shopping on Snap, Nike’s Risk Pays Off and Departures at Instagram

Lunch Break: September 26

Lunch Break: September 26

QUICK PR READS YOU CAN TACKLE BETWEEN BITES

Happy Wednesday, Lunch Breakers!

It’s the first week of fall, and no matter what the temperature is, consider it officially acceptable to order a certain pumpkin spice-flavored beverage and start hoarding your favorite Halloween candy.

We’ve rounded up the biggest stories of the week from brands that are constantly making headlines.

The Key to Victory

At the beginning of the NFL season, Anheuser-Busch announced that it would install Bud Light-stocked “Victory Fridges” around Cleveland that would only unlock if the Cleveland Browns won a regular season game. Sound simple? Here’s the catch: The Browns hadn’t been victorious since December 24, 2016.

Last Thursday, the Browns broke their 635-day losing streak with a comeback win over the Jets. Ecstatic, and thirsty, fans rushed the recently unlocked fridges, all while posting excitedly on social media. Raise a cold one and say “dilly dilly” to Anheuser-Busch’s clever campaign.

Snap & Shop

Amazon and Snap are teaming up to change the way you shop. Snap is rolling out a new feature that will allow users to scan a product or barcode to bring up an Amazon card that will give users product details, price and similar items—as well as a direct link to purchase the product. This partnership looks promising with Snap’s users 20 percent more likely to make a mobile purchase than those who don’t Snap.

Social commerce is on the rise, and other platforms already have similar features, like Pinterest’s “Shop the Look Pins” and Instagram’s new shopping channel on Instagram Explore. Could this be the future of shopping?

Nike’s $6 Billion Dollar Man

After Nike’s controversial campaign featuring Colin Kaepernick launched on Labor Day weekend, it caused a media firestorm. Those against Nike’s ad burned merchandise and boycotted the brand. The Swoosh could’ve been doomed because of angry customers, but instead, the athletic brand is thriving.

Since the campaign’s launch, social mentions have more than tripled, and Nike is getting 50 percent more online mentions than it did prior to Kaepernick joining Nike’s lineup. This controversy didn’t just translate to social chatter—it also directly impacted market value. Nike reported that since the Kaepernick ad, its added nearly $6 billion to its market value. Controversy sells.

[bctt tweet=”Nike proves that controversy sells. It increased its market value more than $6 billion since launching the Colin Kaepernick campaign earlier this month. ” username=”@stantoncomm”]

Unfollowed

Yesterday, Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger abruptly stepped away from the social media giant, which has been owned by Facebook since 2012. It’s unclear exactly why the duo left and under what circumstances, but it’s rumored that tensions with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg had been fraught in recent months.

As reported by The Verge, this announcement caused complete PR chaos at Instagram HQ. Spokespeople at both Facebook and Instagram were unaware of the situation and Systrom posted a departure note on the corporate blog that alluded to his new business venture with Kreiger. Meanwhile, Zuckerberg kept relatively quiet as Systrom and Kreiger shared celebratory photos with their followers. The future of Instagram is now in Facebook’s control, and as CNN’s Kaya Yurieff said, “It better not mess it up.”

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