OUR FULL APRIL FOOLS' DAY GUIDE🃏
THIS GUIDE IS FREE! NOT A JOKE!
APRIL FOOLS’ DAY MADNESS:
If you work in the consumer world or just care about good marketing, you’re probably aware that today was FILLED with April Fools' Day posts. We had a feeling this year would be especially unhinged when Sweetgreen started teasing their drop 3 days ago. We didn’t expect to be pregaming this day all weekend, but honestly, we’re not complaining.
The sheer volume of posts from brands across industries was overwhelming. So much so that we seem to have reached some sort of posting limit and had to move our business to Substack (sorry, Meta!). We thought this would be a good opportunity to debut our April Fools’ Day guide. It’s a full list of brands that stood out to us, organized by theme or industry. Let’s get into it:
THE ONES WE’LL REMEMBER:
Sol de Janeiro Laughed at Themselves: In response to their viral spider controversy, Sol launched the fake “Aranha Spider Salve + Cheirosa 8 Perfume Mist” said to be inspired by the Amazon Rainforest AND the thousands of reviews, DMs, and feedback they received about their “Delícia Drench Body Butter.” This was a genius way to address the situation in a light-hearted way that also allowed them to poke fun at themselves, versus belittling the situation. It's a similar-ish approach BÉIS took in response to complaints about their bags getting dirty. Instead of playing offense, they hosted their “BÉIS Wash” activation, offering free cleaning for dirty Weekenders and Carry Ons. It's a perfect example of "actions speak louder than words" in action.
Sweetgreen’s Dental Hygiene Kit: We’ll be honest - this one got us. Part of it was because Sweetgreen was the first brand to tease April Fool's Day, but also because the comps were so spot on. HUGE shout out to Joy Chen, Brand Designer at Sweetgreen, who 3D modeled and designed the whole thing. We also love when brands tap into a very human experience consumers have with their products and play into it in creative ways. (This is basically why campaigns for Starface and Julie - basically all of Julie Schott’s brands - resonate so strongly.)
Equinox’s Luxury Lost and Found: High-end brands frequently struggle with wanting to be cuLturAllY rELevaNt, but not wanting to dilute their positioning as a premium brand. In our opinion, Equinox just provided a great example of how to do this tastefully. They posted about a fake auction for "Lost and Found" items found in their locker rooms, including the following:
16GB Custom Engraved Flash Drive
18 Inch Bearskin Hat
10-Karat Jewelry with 422 Diamonds
You get the gist.
MANY CAME IN PAIRS:
Olipop’s Sour Cream and Onion Soda: As the biggest Sour Cream and Onion fans ever, we wanted this to be real so badly. That’s probably why this one almost got us too. Honestly, collaborating with such a large corporate company on a post like this is not easy, so kudos to the Olipop team for pulling this off. It made the entire thing even more believable and exciting.
BÉIS Expands Past Luggage to…an Airline: BÉIS joined forces with Indy Blue’s brand, Lonely Ghost, on “Lonély Air,” their fake new airline. Honestly, Shay Mitchell should just paint her private jet red and make this happen. It feels like all our Ryan and Spirit Air vacations have been preparing us for this very moment.
Fly by Jing’s Heartburn Relief Hot Sauce: You know when you eat too much hot sauce and experience an insane degree of heartburn? Same. That’s why Fly by Jing and Arrae ideated the xxxtra spicy hot sauce with built-in 1-hour heartburn and acid reflux relief, AND the first de-bloat Dietary Supplement infused with the hottest peppers in China. These two brands could have individually come up with great concepts, but doing something together that plays to each other's strengths was so smart. We genuinely hope they actually make this.
Shake Shack’s 20K Gold Fry Fork: It’s a thing for your thing! Your fry things! Shake Shack teamed up with Reinstein Ross on a 20K solid gold Forever Fry Fork™️. They joke, but this would 100% sell as branded merch. Who wouldn’t want to eat their fries with a Forever Fry Fork?! It would also work as a switch to reusable forks in their retail locations if they ever were to do that. But on second thought, not sure how we feel about reusable forks at Shake Shack…
Dill Pickle Califia Farms Creamer: It could very well be their branding, but anything Grillo’s Pickles does we love. That’s how we feel about their “Dill Pickle Creamer” with Califia Farms. Wouldn’t use it (not that it’s real), but we still love it. Because it’s Grillo’s Pickles. You know what we mean?
Honey, but Make it Heineken Honey Bee-r: This morning, we weren’t aware how crazy April Fools’ Day would get, so we posted about this week being a big week for honey. It probably got swallowed up by all the other news, but regardless, Heineken’s collab with Mike’s Hot Honey got us even more excited about this honey takeover situation. Who’s next?!
A GOOD DAY TO BE A DOG:
Crown Affair’s Hair Care for Pups: The comment section on this post is so relatable. The TLDR: people are saying these dogs have better hair than them, or that they actually look like them. See? Relatable. The more we think about this idea, the more we need Crown Affair to sponsor the National Dog Show this year. All those dog moms would eat this up!
Dogs Should Wear Supergoop’s SPF Too: We spent a large chunk of the day reading about why dogs need SPF (no pet owners here, just FYI). That pretty much explains all the enthusiastic comments on Supergoop’s post, with people saying they would actually buy this "Pup Screen SPF 30" for their dogs if it were real. Seems like a big white space to us...
SkinnyDipped’s Chocolate Bark for Dogs: Before you say anything, SkinnyDipped clarified that the products are made with Carob, so they’re safe for you and your dogs. We feel like there could have been a stronger April Fools’ concept to be done here that feels more relevant to their products, but maybe that’s just us.
BEAUTY BRANDS SHOWED UP:
Tower 28 Beauty Expands Their SOS Line: Tower 28 is heavily investing in marketing their SOS Spray, with collaborations such as Rumble and Kung Fu Panda, as well as a Rescue Station activation in Los Angeles. April Fools’ marked yet another clever way to promote their SOS line, this time introducing a new extension: the SOS Personal Lube. As expected from SOS fans, everyone wants the lube!
EXPERIMENT Follows Softwear with Hardwear: Coming off of their recent “Softwear” launch, EXPERIMENT introduced “Hardwear,” designed for men. It is, in their own words, “a lip treatment for men that does not hydrate, exfoliate, or protect your lips, leaving them rough and tough– just like a man should be 🦾.” The comments section is sending us:
“I really don’t think 40% sandpaper is enough grit”
“??? Missing the Clorox wipe step???”
“For men who like it rough 💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼”
OUAI Teases…the Wrong Perfume: OUAI has been teasing the return of their St. Bart’s fragrance for a while, and chose April Fools’ Day to continue the tease. They posted about bringing back the “Shibuya Fragrance,” but of course, everyone flooded the comments saying they want St. Barts instead. They could have done something bigger here, but we’re not disappointed - it feels like a natural extension of their launch campaign.
ENDING WITH A QUICK HOT LIST:
Poppi’s Nostalgic Ring Poppi: Nostalgic ring pops, “Ring Poppi,” available in a variety of fruity flavors including: Watermelon, Wild Berry, and Strawberry Lemon.
Ghia’s Mini 2oz Bottle: Is this their way of gauging product interest because we all know this would sell out instantly.
BODY Vodka’s Line of Milk Vodka: This is pretty self-explanatory. It’s described as “light milk” made from Vodka. Confused? Think of it as the newest non-dairy milk alternative.
Jolie’s On-the-Go Stanley Cup: Now you can bring Jolie showerheads with you wherever you are in the world, TSA approved!
The Standard’s Le Bain Hot Tub Water: If you know you know. If you don’t know, we’re shocked, but watch Saltburn.
Aura Bora Takes on Liquid Death: For some reason, we never put these two in the same category. Maybe that’s the very point of this post.
Graza’s Grazushers: Nostalgic fruit gushers in the flavor “Picual Punch” made with extra virgin olive oil, of course.
Olive & June Take Color to Another Surface: Nothing is worse than painting your walls only to find that it ruined your entire manicure. Say no more, thanks to Olive & June’s "Home Interior Paint" collection. Now your mani CAN match your walls.
Chillhouse’s Chill Bling Collection: 24 diamond-covered Chill Tips featuring lab grown diamonds for $15,999! Speaking of an affordable price…
Last Crumb’s “Rolex of Cookie” Collection: For $12,000, you too can get your hands on 12 micro-batch, Michelin-quality creations made by Last Crumb’s head chef.
Want to submit a pitch? Email (or DM) us: peoplebrandsandthings@gmail.com