The Drink Cart: Bee Season
A weekly newsletter cocktail of advertising, interesting things that will haunt your dreams, pop culture, baseball and even a drink from the cart after a long week.
Last week we were feeling 90s. This week we’re going back further for some 1980s style and vibes.
This week’s “newslettering” includes:
Airbnb’s new lodging lottery options
Walmart’s plot to sink Trader Joe’s through branding
Dumplings, Old Canadian tourism ads, cocktail bars raising money, return policy thinking, bees, and yes more hats!
Plus, the most 80s of cocktails - The Long Island.
Ad highlights
Let’s start with dumplings. If this isn’t the best ad for a dumpling shop you have ever seen, you should probably never be allowed to eat dumplings again. I don’t make the rules.
Airbnb launched their latest summer updates this week. I still like their format of how they roll out new features. Most notable is Icons. “Airbnb is introducing Icons, a new category of extraordinary experiences hosted by the greatest names in music, film, television, art, sports, and more. Icons let you step into worlds you’ve only ever dreamed of.”
These icons, which are basically lotteries, include staying the Up house, in the Ferrari museum, the animated mansion from X-Men 97, and staying in the Musée d’Orsay. As well as a bunch of other VIP type things with celebrities and influencers. It’s a little Disneyland - and perhaps unlike the ill-fated Star Wars Hotel. It’s a given, and my feed already shows this, that these icons will make a big impact as a pure marketing campaign even if only a few people ever get to experience them.
Yes, chef! Absolutely do not hate this very well placed OOH Square ad around the real location and filming location of The Bear.
Ad lowlights
When I was listening to the Jomboy Baseball Today podcast yesterday, there was a classic podcast host read for the new Tushy Travel bidet. Here’s the thing, in-between calling out “Over 2 million butts” they were really pushing the 30-day money back return policy.
And that made me spend the rest of the podcast thinking about what happens to all the returned, unwanted bidets? There can’t be a strong second hand or previously loved bidet market. Can there? Is that even legal? Do you send them back? So now you’re thinking about that very weird value prop too. And worse - the Tushy shipping and receiving department must be utter chaos.
Speaking of things that could use a bidet. See what I did there? Totally cool expert writer transition. We all see through this launch of Walmart’s new in-house private label brand Bettergoods right? I agree with Andrea Hernández from Snaxshot who rightly just called it, “gentrified groceries.”
Not that there is anything wrong with that - it’s just that every thing is starting to look like one mono-brand engineered for Tiktok consumption. The bigger thing might be that is a very clear shot across the bow of Trader Joe’s. Do we care?
I’m not sure this is a low light. It might just be super weird? I just don’t think I even understand this spritz brand website.
They definitely didn’t want people to visit Canada in the 1980s did they? DID THEY? What is even happening in this tourism ad? It’s fascinating to see that they were trying to change the stereotype of Americans that were just about moose and Mounties. This is wild. How did you even travel in the 80s. No hidden gems? No camera phones? Absolutely savage.
Things I can’t stop thinking about
I'm still coming to grips with this Death & Co. expansion investment stuff that Emily Sundberg posted in Feed Me this week. The question is, do we need this famous cocktail bar in every city like it is a run of the mill Chilis? Does it need to also become a hotel? Can’t it just be a good bar in New York? As she noted, “When did we stop being really fucking good at one thing, and have to start being mid at everything?” She also had a pretty funny note about this being the kind of place that doesn’t have bartenders - only mixologists.
Unrelated, I was in a new place in Toronto this weekend, The Well, it's this wild outdoor shopping area which sounds great now that it's post-winter. But it’s an absolutely nuts concept during winter. I went to two places. The Dorset - an upscale english pub-ish type place - which featured a pretty insane happy hour turning a $21 martini into an afforable $10.50. Then to the french place next door, La Plume (FYI: the mustard aioli with the chicken was really solid).
Well turns out they are just part of a larger brand. And in the same complex they have the British pub, a french brasserie and another joint called Aera that promises to pay homage to "21st century American cuisine." Whatever that means. The brand is very good at executing and the two places delivered good drinks and food. Although I hated the waiters with giant tablets to put orders in.
I'm not anti-chain at all - and this kind of company at least makes it so you don’t not the same damn thing in every part of the city. But feels like it's very paint by numbers in kind of an All-inclusive resort restaurant branding meets Hollywood set dec type stuff. I’m sure some influencers will still deem them cute little “hidden gems” and not a big chain.
Wild Stat: Dominos has 10% of America - 33 million - enrolled in their Rewards Program
They do not make careers like this anymore (That’s an old-school Linkedin CV)
Love this idea of the pre-Tim Hortons coffee shop chain Honey Dew that was owned by Orange Crush
I like that that the Green Giant brand is going to eat plant based company’s lunch with veggie dino tots.
Let’s talk about Dog law firms
Just watch the opening credits to Adventures in Babysitting to clear that last one from your mind
And since we’re doing opening credits: Even the opening credits to the last season of CHiPs credits - which had its final episode air 41 years ago this week - was so burned into my brain
Deep cut: The posters in the original V mini-series that the Visitors plastered on the streets were wildly suspicious, no?
Totally self indulgent baseball and gambling content
Honeyball. Still laughing about the 2-hour bee delay in a game this week. Yep, a bee colony set up shop behind home plate, and the Arizona Diamondbacks had to bring in a beekeeper to deal with the situation. He’s got a hype reel, including being played in to Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out for a Hero” to save the game, then he threw out the first pitch, and even got his own baseball card. It’s taking everything not to get like 20 of these and chase those autographs.
We also noticed two other stories in betting news. First, we learned about the rather unfortunately named social betting app or platform, KUTT. An app to help you bet directly with your friends on pretty much whatever you want. And second, Dave & Busters - the growing chain of arcade bars - is going to let you bet on skee ball and other such games. So basically all-betting, all-the time. Got it.
Adding mini baseball cards to player’s bats to then make into limited edition cards is the kind of racket I can get behind.
Hat of the Week
I hate that we have to do this. But the new Tampa Bay City Connect uniforms and hats are just fantastic. It’s a bridge. It’s a manta ray. It’s both. Check out the launch vid. Between the extended universe of icons and graphics, and all the little details, they really did make something very cool. I hate the Tampa Bay Rays. These are probably the best City Connects yet - and that just makes me even more nervous for the impending Toronto edition - coming later this month?
Last call: The Drink Cart Recipe
This week, inspired by some very 1980s TV and even retro 8-Bit video games, I got to thinking about how many Ad Agency folks ended their weeks consuming Long Island Iced Teas back in 1983. I honestly didn’t know there were two competing origin stories of the drink. I feel like I’m a New York originalist.
Story time. I was late to the party. They were already borderline out of style, but that didn’t stop The Keg from having one magical summer - circa maybe ‘92 or ‘94 where they were still riding the unfiltered 80s vibes (including smoking sections) and serving 3oz Long Islands in a grotesque oversized faux-beach buckets. It was completely absurd.
Thankfully you can still get the trashy premixed booze which I always thought was fascinating and makes this 5 liquor cocktail in a snap. Truthfully I don’t think I’ve had one since that summer. It has lots of ingredients - but it’s honestly an easy swamp water of a cocktail where anything goes.
Long Island Iced Tea - Trash Bucket Version 🍹
3/4 oz Vodka
3/4 oz Tequila
3/4 oz White Rum
3/4 oz Gin
1/2 oz Triple Sec
1 oz Lemon Juice
Coke
Serve it over lots of ice preferably in some of these buckets for the full experience
Garnish? Lemon slice if you’re feeling extra fancy. Highly recommend a garish turtle mocking plastic straw too
Let me know what you think of this weeks newsletter in the comments. Or I’ll spam you on Linkedin with even more dumb baseball hat talk. Don’t make me do it.
Old Man Bishop would be proud of this post!