Directly to the content Skip to maincontent Directly to the footer Skip to footercontent

Meme Products

Media Technology and Society Media Technology and Society Media Technology and Society

Meme Products

When a meme becomes a product.

A post by Felix Kleine

Monday, 7 February 2022

Before we get into that, we should first define what a meme actually is. A meme can be pretty much anything, but most often it is an image, a GIF, a video clip or a song. But there seems to be no limit, because it can also be a challenge, a dance, a text, a person or even a product. What all of them have in common is that they are shared and discussed on social media platforms, in most cases simply for humour’s sake. Many people even say that they constitute a culture of their own, as many memes are incomprehensible to outsiders. As memes are often based on pop culture media, events and news, they usually have a short lifespan and can lead to copyright issues. The sheer volume of memes led to the creation of the knowyourmeme.com database, which contains over 4,600 confirmed meme entries.

Because memes are easy to create and share, they can (if used correctly) be an extremely effective marketing tool known as ‘memetic marketing’. However, it is not merely an efficient and inexpensive way to attract attention; it is very difficult for companies and brands to use it correctly. Many users find meme content from companies ‘cringy’. They know it was created solely for marketing purposes. Therefore, memes from brands have to be exceptionally good to avoid backfiring. A good example of a brand that uses memes successfully is Wendy’s. The company saw a 113 per cent jump in Twitter mentions in 2017 and a nearly 50 per cent increase in profits since it started using memetic marketing. It even reached the top spot on Spotify’s Global Viral 50 with its mixtape. You read that right – Wendy’s produced a mixtape … and it was a huge success!

Back to the topic at hand. A meme product is a product based on a meme and/or created as a joke. Let’s focus on the quintessential meme product – the Xbox fridge. It began as a meme in December 2019 on Twitter. Some users poked fun at the new design of the Xbox Series X gaming console and started photoshopping it into kitchen pictures as a fridge. Microsoft enjoyed the meme, saw the opportunity and jumped on the hype train. They released three Xbox fridges in October 2020. Fans laughed, but were upset that only three had been produced. So Microsoft promised to produce many more mini fridges if they won the Twitter brand vote against Skittles. Xbox won with 50.5 per cent and kept its promise. On 19 October 2021, the Xbox mini fridge was only available in the EU via the GameStop online store for around €100. However, scalpers – people who buy products in bulk to resell them at a higher price once they’re out of stock – snapped up almost the entire stock, leaving genuine customers disappointed once again. A new supply has been promised but not yet officially announced.

In an interview with journalist and editor Daniel Herbig of the well-known tech news website ‘heise online’, some questions about this type of product were answered. I will try to summarise the statements. First of all, there are not many meme products on the market. Apart from Xbox fridges, only Elon Musk’s ‘Not-A-Flamethrower’ flamethrower could be called a meme product. Products such as the Razer Hazel/Zephyr mask were not intended as a joke, but as a serious product, even if it has no real value as it is not an alternative to an FFP2 mask. Also, realistically, it will probably only be worn by gamers at a gaming convention.

This brings us to the next point. The people who demand these products are mostly younger people – mainly male gamers and collectors – who are clearly into memes and pop culture and want to feel connected to the product, the brand and the community. Companies often lose money producing these items, but they gain loyal, hardcore fans and an emotional connection that can lead to more sales. This type of marketing is very limited. It is a strategy that is quickly overused and can backfire if used too often. It is also very risky because the company could end up with a damaged reputation and a warehouse full of products that nobody wants. Demand has to come from the fans and cannot be forced.

Overall, the products are primarily intended as a joke and are not made for the average consumer, but for genuine fans who are willing to spend money on a product that may result in a financial loss for the company, whilst at the same time generating loyal customers.

Sources:

Back to the project overview