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At the time of publication, more than half a million football fans have found their way to YouTube to watch four and a half minutes of retired New England Patriots greats Julian Edelman and Rob Gronkowski joshing one another while pigging out on chicken wings.
As Super Bowl marketing goes (it’s actually pre-Super Bowl marketing: Bounty doesn’t have an ad in the game), it’s a notable departure from the standard formula of celeb endorsers talking up a product with varying degrees of believability. Bounty paper towels do take center stage, of course, but pretty much only to wipe the chops.
Part of a series of athlete-studded episodes called “Spill the Sauce,” this shoot features the kind of chitchat that fans eat up, such as how Edelman defended himself with a BB gun after a teammate threw an egg at his head, and how Buffalo, New York, is the only town in America where you can get decent blue cheese.
“You were my hero,” Gronk coos at Edelman, recalling their rookie days of 2010. “You were driving a nice sports car.”
How’d a straight-laced corporation like Procter & Gamble get two paid endorsers to act as though they’re just sitting in a man cave? It all started last year during Super Bowl LVII, at a place called Radio Row.
Big room, no food
Set up every year in the days before the Big Game, Radio Row is the nerve center for some 140 media outlets—a huge room packed with reporters and program directors, coaches and players (whether they’re in the game or not), plus a slew of brands that want in on the pregame buzz. Last year, in the Phoenix Convention Center, those brands included FanDuel, DraftKings, Verizon, TikTok, Old Spice and Bounty.
Bounty had recently hit on the insight that chicken wings are the most-consumed food during the Super Bowl and that, owing to the viscous mess that wings tend make, fans tend to use paper towels instead of napkins. Gronk’s job for Bounty was to walk around with some wings and, well, act like Gronk. (Think: 34-year-old man who’s still a teenager.)
And while watching him, “we learned a couple things,” Bounty brand director Christina Cullis told Adweek. “No. 1, when you get into Radio Row, it’s very difficult [for attendees] to leave because of the security. The other thing we learned is that nobody is feeding them.”
