Three examples of great Halloween PR stunts

November 7, 2019 Tom Clark | Comments Off

As Halloween creeps its way back into our lives, the public relations team at Adoni Media have created a list of their favourite seasonal stunts.

  1. Burger King

In 2016, Burger King store stepped their Halloween game up, dressing a New York store as a ghost version of their rivals, McDonald’s.

The stunt aimed to communicate the fact Burger King flame-grills its burgers instead of frying them.

The sheet included the McDonald’s logo, yellow eyebrows similar to the golden arches, and the Burger King logo. While the Whopper burgers were in costume, custom-made boxes resembling those of the Big Mac also made a feature.

To no surprise, the internet went into meltdown over the stunt. It effectively conveyed Burger King’s flame-grilling cooking style and proved there’s nothing scarier than a fried burger.

  • Fanta

The popular soft drink brand Fanta gave Londoners a fright, sending a massive creepy crawly through the streets of the capital.

The metre-wide spider scuttled past shops and supermarkets, giving commuters, joggers and cyclists the fright of their life.

Hidden cameras were set up everywhere to record the hilarious reactions to the life-like arachnid.

The eight-legged monster prank was set up to spread awareness about Fanta’s new Halloween flavours, and did it ever.

The spook-tacular stunt generated widespread coverage on national media websites, growing the already global brand even more.

  • Bumble

The popular dating app where the girl messages first took a slightly comedic stance on a big issue in the online dating world.

As online romance becomes increasingly popular, ‘ghosting’ is on the rise. However, experts say having seemingly infinite options makes it feel as though people are disposable, which led Bumble to take a stand.

Bumble sent messages to its users in 2018, prompting them to politely end a conversation if ghosting is on the cards. The effort to stop the practice asked bumble users to take a “ghosting vow” before using the app.

While it’s not a direct PR stunt, the seasonal action definitely got people talking.