Ben & Jerry's Expands Tweet-Driven Freebies Tour

Building on a "wildly successful" summer 2010 initiative that had fans all over New York and Boston tweeting to bring Ben & Jerry's trucks dispensing free ice cream to their doors, the Unilever brand is this summer expanding the experiential/social media promotion to five cities. 

During this year's "Summer Scoop Truck Tour," B&J trucks will patrol Los Angeles and Miami now through June 10; New York and San Francisco between June 20 and July 29; and Boston during the month of August.

In addition to their pre-planned stops at retailers, community events, businesses ("office invasions") and other high-traffic locations, the trucks' teams will be checking in on Foursquare -- which directly posts to the tour's Twitter account (@BenJerrysTruck) -- and sending tweets encouraging local fans to tweet back (or use other social media) to request a stop near their locations.

The trucks then use fans' requests to plan the schedule for their next day of fan-requested stops. "We're having a two-way dialogue with consumers -- instead of having a tour schedule set in stone, we're giving Ben & Jerry's fans the opportunity to tell us where we should go," notes the brand's integrated marketing manager and "tour ringleader," Jay Curley.

Manchester, N.H.-based experiential marketing agency Gigunda Group is executing, including planning and coordinating the tour schedule, managing the brand ambassadors and consumer messaging, and activating the social media sampling on-demand plan. Edelman Digital is managing Twitter, Fousquare, Tumbler and Facebook integration, and Cone is handling public relations.

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