Unless you’ve been living under a rock you have probably seen this bathing suit on your Instagram feed yesterday. Chances are more than once.
It was part of a promotion from Sunny Co. Clothing – a clothing company founded by two college students from San Diego. They offered anyone a promo code for a free bathing suit (paying only shipping and handling) who re-posted their picture and tagged them in it. Within one day their Instagram following grew from 7,000 to over 780,000.
#sunnycoclothing went from 7k followers to 780k followers on Instagram in less than a day.. scam or not, genius marketing.
— Sarah Scott (@Sarahliz944) May 4, 2017
There were many debates on whether or not the offer was legit.
For anyone wondering if you'll actually get your Sunny Co Clothing swimsuit in the mail #sunnycares #sunnycoclothing 💔 pic.twitter.com/fSUdPPuCZC
— Lil' Mami Nat (@nataliejduke) May 4, 2017
When all that shipping money rolls in from your latest scam: "Worked hard for this view. 💪🏼🤑" #sunnycoclothing #sunnycares pic.twitter.com/ODrq6N3IIi
— Sondra 🌻 (@gorgeousbrains) May 4, 2017
Some were sharing screenshots from their orders to proof it was real. This Twitter user even pointed out that according to Sunny Co. Clothing’s website they donate 1$ of each purchase to the Alzheimers Foundation.
I don't care what y'all say this was genius by some college kids who are also giving money to a charity while killing it. #sunnycoclothing pic.twitter.com/eejaf9UyQ6
— Ryan Fitzgerald⚾ (@RFitzin) May 3, 2017
There were so many orders that Sunny Co. Clothing issued an apology stating they “truly had no idea the response was going to be so overwhelming” and promised they would “make [their] best to honour the first 50.000 orders placed”. They also stated that they would refund the money to anyone who accidentally ordered without the promo code. Even though they are not refunding transactions costs, this leads me to believe that they probably did miscalculate this marketing stunt and it was not meant to be a scam. I agree with the many voices calling it a pretty genius marketing strategy.
I honestly think that #sunnycoclothing giving away that bikini was a brilliant #marketing move! pic.twitter.com/xElEml2bgo
— Stephanie (@stephanieegiron) May 3, 2017
No matter what you think of the bathing suit; This red craze on your Instagram feed inspired some great new Memes.
By the looks of it… this is gonna be everyone this summer #sunnycoclothing pic.twitter.com/8ZRUNITgSJ
— DRAGO. 𓅓 (@DagoFierros) May 3, 2017