"Frankly, this is what culture needs right now"

We have seen Cuppy Coffee for Dunkin’ race around a track, we have seen the Flash race against a fan in the outfield, and countless other in-game promotional challenges have graced the feeds of millions online. Every time you go to a sporting event and, say, you have to guess which hat a baseball is under, the crowd usually reacts the loudest to that play over most things that actually happen on the field. And it makes sense. It’s the one time the fans are in on some sort of action.

But what the QuikTrip Hot Dog Home Bun Race (“QTHDHBR” for short) has done for the world is nothing short of captivating. If you don’t know what I am talking about, feast your eyes on the most pure form of humanity:

So Bunblievably simple. And if the crowd is able to beat the clock and get the dog in the bun, everyone gets a free Quiktrip hot dog (side note: imagine going to QuikTrip and not also getting like 4 other snacks. If you go to QuikTrip after this game for a dog and only have the dog you’re borderline a psychopath. Also not a paid promotion for QuikTrip, more so a paid promotion for sanity). I think this challenge has at least 300M views organically across socials. It’s been on the news, in the feeds, and was even discussed by the two biggest idiots in marketing news.

The difference between this and most other gimmicky in-game promotions is that most in-game promotions offer a way for fans to win something, which of course people get excited about, and some do have a challenge involved for at least one fan. BUT, very few involve a bunch of the fans having to work together to solve a challenge.

So, I naturally had to find out more about how this idea came to be, and how it’s going. I asked Pat Laughlin, Co-CCO of Laughlin Constable, a few questions about his agency coming up with this idea for QuikTrip. Laughlin Constable has been the creative agency of record for QuikTrip for about a year. (subscribe to see the rest. it costs $0)