Pornhub, Corn Nuts, Other Brands Rally In Support Of Depressed Orange Drink
Two nights ago towards the end of the Super Bowl, in what seemed like a wacky plot from ‘Nathan For You‘, dark clouds came rolling in & darkened the luminous mood of once popular ’90s orange-drink brand, Sunny Delight.
What some would think was possibly a sad, drunken PR rep getting their accounts mixed up during the halftime show may have been a bizarre PR move. The alarming “I can’t do this anymore” tweet now has almost 125K retweets, 300K likes, & has sparked dozens of responses, memes & think pieces.
From Greg Morabito at Eater:
Especially right now, Twitter users are attuned to spot any tweet that could be considered a cry for help — which is why this new Sunny D message is all the more egregious. Outside of its original context, its vagueness elicited lots of real emotions and concerns: If the social media manager of this account needs help, the powers that be at Sunny D should not only step in and let the employee take a mental health break, some thought. If this was a more calculated stunt — if there was no one actually suffering on the other end of the Twitter account — then this is just an act of pure exploitation, others argued; an attempt to leverage the conversations about millennial burnout and Gen Z’s anxiety into brand engagement.
Whatever the case, people are buzzing about Sunny D for the first time since that absolute heater in ’91.. The “Purple Stuff?!?!” commercial.
Not only that, dozens of other brands have hopped in on the action; many with thoughtful, brand-humanizing responses showing concern (while also alluding to what their own brand sells, of course)… Among them:
Pornhub
Moonpie
Uber Eats
Pop Tarts
Wikipedia
Insomnia Cookies
Corn Nuts
Crest
Healthline
Bark Box
Jack In The Box
USA Sevens Rugby
Snowbird Ski Resort
The San Francisco Shock (E-sports team)
Seattle rock station 99.9 KISW
Xbox Game Pass
GrubHub
MeUndies
We even hopped in the action on this end:
The Rocket
Barstool Sports
Whatever the real story is behind the tweet – it definitely got my attention – but I don’t think it’ll translate into me buying Sunny D anytime soon. Was that the intention anyway? Who knows. But I’m more of a Tang orange powder lady as it is. FYI: You can also clean your dishwasher with that stuff. Healthy, right?
*In closing, it almost feels disingenuous to add this after such a strange topic, but if you are a real person & not an orange drink brand, and you’re having a rough time lately or know someone who is, these lines are always open:
National Suicide Prevention Hotline:1-800-273-8255
Crisis Text Line at 741-741