Some stores, including this store in Olathe, Kansas, have limited the number of Stanley cup purchases per customer due to strong demand for limited edition releases. The Lunar New Year limited edition Thursday observes the year of the dragon. (Shutterstock/Matt Fowler KC),
ACROSS AMERICA — The Lunar New Year that begins next month is the year of the wood dragon. Nowhere on the lunisolar calendar does it say that 2024 is the year of the Stanley cup. Yet it kind of is.
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Just in time for Lunar New Year — an important holiday in China and widely celebrated in countries with significant Chinese populations — Stanley 1913, the manufacturer of the ubiquitous travel cup, has come up with yet another marketing twist to capitalize on its moment in the sun.
A few words of caution: Don’t click the link unless you plan to buy one of Stanley’s limited edition Lunar New Year 30-ounce Quencher tumblers, available in red dragon or cream dragon for $35 (40-ounce versions sell for 10 bucks more). It’s OK if you do want to buy — we are not judging — but clicks have consequences.
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The internet remembers. Ads for Stanley cups will overtake your social media feeds. You’ll have to post one of those blue, “marked safe from Stanley cups” flags on your social media pages. It may give your friends a chuckle, but it won’t stop the algorithm. You will remain in the clutches of this ad until you spend some serious time adjusting your settings or search for the next pop culture phenomenon whose promoters fairly taunt, “made you look.”
So trust us when we say people seem to like the recycled stainless steel, dribble-proof, vacuum flask with a reusable straw. It’s insulated and keeps liquids hot or cold for half a day or so, but other cup manufacturers make the same claims.
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And really, there’s nothing fancy — or even particularly Lunar New Year-ish — about them. Even the cultural nod of decorative dragon scales, Camellia flowers and Sakura blossoms disappear when the tapered base sinks into a cupholder. No dragon looms large anywhere on the cup, but the trademark Stanley bear is front and center.
(Photo courtesy of Stanley 1913)
Will People Behave?
We can only hope the rollout Thursday of the Lunar New Year cups goes more smoothly than the cluster funk over Stanley Valentine’s cups at some Target stores. It was very messy out there for a while.
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That limited release sparked online bidding wars among collectors willing to spend hundreds of dollars to procure the cups. Some guy jumped over the counter of a Target Starbucks store to steal a box of tumblers, according to a video on TMZ. And recently in California, a woman was arrested and accused of stealing 65 Stanley cups worth nearly $2,500.
There’s more. But the point is, these cups, praised for their versatility, don’t always bring out the best behavior in people. Why, though? We’re not talking Louis Vuitton handbags or even limited-edition sneakers. They’re reusable metal drink cups. They’re nice and all, but really?
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People on Reddit, the unfiltered voice of the people, praise the Stanley cups for their durability, the stable history of the more than century-old company that manufactures them, and the huge sales spike after an e-commerce blog catering to women promoted them. That is just part of the Stanley cup success story.
The drink containers are common in the social media influencers’ #WaterTok challenge videos on TikTok. So are competitors such as Hydro Flask, Yeti and others, but not at the same volume as Stanley. The brand’s popularity skyrocketed in the teen and younger markets after a November TikTok video showed a charred but still full of ice Stanley cup in a car that had been destroyed by fire.
In a surprise response and a stroke of public-relations genius in the same TikTok thread, Stanley brand president Terence Reilly offered to replace the car of the woman whose video has now been viewed more than 9.1 million times.
“Well, we’re gonna send you some Stanleys, but there’s one more thing and we’ve never done this before and we’ll probably never do it again, but we’d love to replace your vehicle,” he said. “Yeah, all of us at Stanley, we’d really like to replace your vehicle.”
By Christmas, the at-one-time masculine emblem of the working class and outdoorsy types had become a status symbol, especially among young women. Watch this video of a little girl happy-crying over her Stanley.
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One Reddit user sort of loves that.
“When Stanley became the ‘It’ cup, I had to laugh to myself, because I will never forget how faithfully my dad took his green Stanley thermos with the chain-like handle on the side (you know the one) every single day to work,” the person said. “He was devastated when one reached the end of its lifespan somehow (probably left it on the roof of the truck) and in the days before internet shopping, he was convinced any other thermos ‘wouldn’t be the same.’ ”
Another user, reflecting on the popularity of the cup as a fashion accessory, finds it “weird how an average product can become ‘the thing.’ ”
Stacy Schwartz, a marketing expert from Rutgers Business School-Newark and New Brunswick, told Patch that many product crazes discovered “by accident” are short-lived without smart marketers who know how to harness the power of social media and build on previous successes in the market.
Stanley clearly has reined in something valuable.
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“You … can’t ignore the importance of culturally relevant timing,” Schwartz said. “While the Stanley tumbler is a big craze right now, it was not the first metal water bottle to be viewed as a fashion accessory. Stanley benefits from the work that S’well, Yeti, Hydroflask, and other fashion-forward refillable water bottle brands have done to prepare the market for this moment.”
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Stanley has been able to ride the wave of popularity by limiting the availability of its colorful cups, using a high-demand, scarce-supply approach that builds customer excitement for new limited-edition releases, Schwartz said.
However, she added, “Such intense growth is typically followed by an even faster fade to make way for the next craze.”
“In hindsight, product crazes of the past are considered ‘fads’ that marketers (and consumers) enjoyed while they lasted,” she said. “Think Beanie Babies and Cabbage Patch Kids.”
Patch’s Eric Kiefer contributed from New Jersey.
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