Burger King Lets Message Control Go and Wins Big

After Burger King agreed to let Heavy.com hand out king masks, amateur video makers produced clips that have been watched 9.1 million times since September, according to the NY Times. Heavy insisted that Burger King and its lawyers have no right to see the videos before they were posted. Initially wary, Burger King agreed.

"Anyone could have purchased a king mask, which we sell online, done exactly the same stuff and put it up on their own blog," Gillian Smith, Burger King's senior director for media and interactive marketing, said. "It was a great way to let people have fun with the king masks and see the king as another piece of pop culture." Bravo!

Many of the videos are funny, some are bizzare, but then again, what could possibly be weirder than the Burger King character?

Let me repeat: the idea of message control has always been an illusion. Posted by B.L. Ochman

"Let me repeat: the idea of message control has always been an illusion"

Too true. No matter how hard it wants to, a brand will never be able to control what consumers do with its product or who uses it. Just look at Range Rover and Timerland.

Those are the last two brands you would ever think might skew urban, but then they both blow up huge in that market and the brands are confused: that definitely wasn’t their intended demo, but yet, they can’t refuse the bump in sales.