Popularity
In late 2008 and early 2009 the Snuggie brand of sleeved blankets became a pop culture phenomenon, sometimes described humorously as a "cult".
The product became famous after a direct response commercial promoting the product was aired. It was featured on television programs like Today where cast and crew donned Snuggie blankets for a segment which was described as looking like a gospel choir. Others have described mass-snuggie wearing as looking like a Harry Potter convention. The Associated Press likened it to a "monk's ensemble in fleece" and proclaimed it the "ultimate kitsch gift". The Snuggie initially sold singly for $14.95, and later in sets of two for $19.95.
The Slanket was mentioned in an episode of NBC's 30 Rock entitled "The Ones". The product has also been ridiculed as a "backwards robe" or simple reinvention of the coat on radio and television talk shows in the United States. Comparisons have also been made with the Thneed, a highly promoted, amorphous garment in the Dr. Seuss story, The Lorax.
On January 30, 2009, a group organized a pub crawl wearing Snuggies in Cincinnati, Ohio. In the following months they went on to complete over 40 more across the nation. Later, a group organized a Snuggie pub crawl in Chicago to raise money for an African orphanage, which led to similar events throughout the United States. An employee at Americans for Tax Reform, a conservative think tank, started a Facebook page called "The Snuggie Cult" and convinced fellow conservatives including Joe the Plumber, Tucker Carlson, and Andrew Breitbart to pose wearing the robes.
The phenomenon resulted in sales of the Snuggie and its rivals that far exceeded their distributors' expectations: more than 4 million Snuggies as of December 2009 and 1 million Slankets as of February 2009. The phenomenon has even resulted in variations such as "Snuggie for Dogs" and Snuggie with printed patterns called "Custom Snuggies".
Australian radio program Labby, Camilla & Stav on B105 tested the claim that one can wear a Snuggie at sporting events, such as a soccer game, a football game or a basketball game. To test this, Labby and Stav wore Snuggies to a State of Origin game. The test was successful. They also dressed a statue of Wally Lewis, which stands in front of Suncorp Stadium, in a Snuggie live on the air. Security guards found it amusing at first but it was removed shortly after.
In the summer of 2009, the Designer Snuggie was released to the public, as well as the Snuggie for Kids and the Snuggie for Dogs. The Snuggie became especially popular during the 2009 Holiday Season.
On March 5, 2010, at a Cavaliers game, Snuggie wearers broke a world-record for sleeved blanket wearing. Over 22,500 fans wore custom-made, limited edition Cleveland Cavaliers Snuggie blankets for 5 minutes. A Guinness World Records representative was on hand to present the official World Record certificate to KeyBank, the Cavaliers and Snuggie. However, in just a little over a month the feat was broken during a Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim home game when over 40,000 spectators wore a promotional Hideki Matsui sleeved blanket for five minutes.
Read more about this topic: Sleeved Blanket
Famous quotes containing the word popularity:
“The popularity of disaster movies ... expresses a collective perception of a world threatened by irresistible and unforeseen forces which nevertheless are thwarted at the last moment. Their thinly veiled symbolic meaning might be translated thus: We are innocent of wrongdoing. We are attacked by unforeseeable forces come to harm us. We are, thus, innocent even of negligence. Though those forces are insuperable, chance will come to our aid and we shall emerge victorious.”
—David Mamet (b. 1947)
“A more problematic example is the parallel between the increasingly abstract and insubstantial picture of the physical universe which modern physics has given us and the popularity of abstract and non-representational forms of art and poetry. In each case the representation of reality is increasingly removed from the picture which is immediately presented to us by our senses.”
—Harvey Brooks (b. 1915)
“In everything from athletic ability to popularity to looks, brains, and clothes, children rank themselves against others. At this age [7 and 8], children can tell you with amazing accuracy who has the coolest clothes, who tells the biggest lies, who is the best reader, who runs the fastest, and who is the most popular boy in the third grade.”
—Stanley I. Greenspan (20th century)