![]() The brand's new slogan is " Up For Anything"-a wisely bet-hedging phrase that suggests the possibility of hedonism without inviting it outright. ![]() Solo's present ad campaign seems a canny effort to split the difference. The company's frat house market is flourishing. College movies are routinely overrun with the receptacle. The association with hard boozing is incredibly strong: Toby Keith wrote an ode to the cup. ![]() You don't endorse it-but you enjoy the ride as long as it lasts." So it is with Solo. If you're the brand manager in that situation you just sort of back away slowly. "The point is that people were buying Smirnoff Ice. The trend began precisely because people didn't like the taste of it." Naturally Smirnoff would prefer its customers actually enjoy the beverage they've worked so hard to make. "People weren't icing one another because Smirnoff Ice is so refreshing. "Icing was not a positive thing," Brown says. But from a brand perspective it gets a little dangerous when you get into the world of excess drinking." If trends emerge and evolve that's a good thing on the usage side. "And yet these things take on a life of their own. "The last thing any brand wants is affiliation with excess," says Dustin Brown, managing director of Original in Toronto. "Binge-drinking" is not a connotation any sensible company would actively court. Though the company itself is quick to emphasize the latter contingent of its demographic-spanning fanbase-and understandably so. You can understand how the Solo cup's ubiquity may be partly self-perpetuating: thrifty collegiate drinkers are drawn to the cheap bulk beer vessel for self-evident reasons, then retain their affection for the product as they reach an age of more dignified get-togethers. The Guy Who Invented Glow Sticks Had No Idea They Were So Popular Maybe we're not a catalyst for the party-but we're always a guest." People have a very strong emotional connection to these cups. One of things we universally saw is that when you put the product in people's hands, every single one of them has a smile on their face. "We did some focus groups a couple years ago and listened to folks talking about our products. And indeed there's research to back this up. "It's just associated with happy times," she says. But why the Solo cup specifically-why this iconic ruby throwaway, as opposed to any other sort of receptacle? Bikoff credits the brand's associative power. Of course the virtues of a plastic cup will be obvious to anyone who's tried to serve drinks to more than a half-dozen people simultaneously. The Solo Cup Company headquarters in Lake Forrest, Illinois, photo via Wikimedia Commons And over decades the classic cup's design has been refined: its base has been squared to improve balance, ribbed grooves now line its sides for a sturdier grip. Still, in the interest of variety, Solo does offer the cup in a number of alternative colors from cobalt to canary. ![]() "It makes sense that consumers would gravitate to this color when you think about the kind of occasions it's used at," says Bikoff. It's striking, splendid, distinctly intense it's what an expert in marketing would call an "emotional" color. Meet Me Under The Disco Ball: A History of Nightlife's Most Enduring Symbolīikoff wasn't certain why Solo elected to make cherry the cup's standard hue-though the attraction is pretty apparent. It minimizes clean-up and maximizes the quality time a person hosting a party can spend with their family and friends." "It became popular with consumers straight away," she explains. The cup can furnish an event with inexpensive glassware that at the end of the night can be disposed of rather than washed and put away. The red Solo cup-only one of the company's products but by far its most recognizable-was introduced to the United States in the 1970s, as what Rebecca Bikoff, a brand manager at Solo, describes as "a time-saving solution" for the hosts of domestic social functions. Then start stacking the cups in a tree shape.The brand itself is called the Solo Cup Company, a disposable plastic goods manufacturer founded in the mid-1930s in the American midwest and acquired, in 2012, by the Dart Container Corporation.Start by having them balance the cardboard rectangle on the tp roll.My kids love any cup stacking challenge so I pulled together this Christmas tree cup stacking STEAM challenge with a holiday twist!Ĭhristmas Tree Cup Stacking STEAM Challenge Video:Ĭheck out the below video to see the challenge in action:Īnd don’t forget to check out our NEW book – 100 Easy STEAM Activities is full of fun games and creative projects to learn early concepts in Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math with materials you already have around the house!
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