Commentary

Hickey Hack's Got Your Back -- Er, Neck


 

Can hickeys be a health concern?

In very rare cases, yes, says WebMD -- if your partner has sucked on and bitten you atop one of the neck’s carotid arteries.

The site does recommend using ice packs followed by warm compresses to bring down swelling and reduce bleeding, as well as taking over-the-counter pain relievers if necessary.

Hickeys, however, are mostly a cosmetic problem, which WebMD says can be concealed with scarves, collared shirts, turtlenecks, bandages, or concealing makeup -- yellow for purple bruises, green for red ones.

That brings us to Hickey Hack, a D2C concealer launched last month by 22-year-old college dropout/entrepreneur Sven Patzer. who’s now stepping up marketing efforts by teaming with The Shorek Twins, identical TikTok dancers with some 53,000 followers. In a press release, Patzer said the twins will develop a series of videos and also “help out with strategic marketing campaigns which can include anything from creating humorous ads to leveraging their influence for product promotion.”

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In their first 17-second video for Hickey Hack, the Shoreks don’t dance but convey a concise product message while displaying and applying the product: “Don’t be embarrassed, we’ve got you covered,” they tell viewers -- while showing quite lot of, um, uncovered skin themselves.  

As you might guess from that video -- and one on the website that features a similar view of a scantily clad female -- the company doesn’t hesitate to lean into all the sexual ramifications of hickeys, with a wink-wink, frat-bro sensibility.

The product’s origin story begins with a reference to Patzer as “well known for being a bit of a ladies’ man,” who one night “ended up hooking up with three different girls! He thought it would be the best night ever… until he looked in the mirror the next morning and saw something horrifying: A huge hickey on his neck!”

Not exactly guaranteed to win over customers of the female persuasion, is it?

And did you know that February 19 was officially designated National Hickey Day? That means  Patzer applied and paid a fee to the National Day Archives, which notes that “We receive hundreds of day requests. Because of this, we ask that you fill out an application to be submitted for review by our team. We want to make sure that National Day Archives remains the highest quality listing of National Days.”

My favorite part of this story, though, might be the fact that Hickey Hack this afternoon is not only the 1,371st best-selling concealer or makeup on Amazon, but also #2,840 in lawn mower deck parts.   

Since a deck is the part of a lawn mower that protects users from its blades and flying grass, I could only assume that someone’s using Hickey Hack to cover up skin cuts from malfunctioning decks.

Indeed, Hickey Hack does promise that, beyond hickeys, it can remove “other red/purple blemishes or marks from the skin instantly.”

But why generalize when you can target the hickey market and have it all to yourself?

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