Popeyes Wants You to Tailgate From Home With a Pretty Great Promo Campaign

Brendan Menapace

NFL football is back, baby! It just looks a little different than we’re used to. Sure, you could still go tailgate in the parking lot, but that’s about the extent of it. And, for safety reasons, it’s probably best to do the tailgating at home. At least that’s what Popeyes and Dr. Pepper think you should do with their new co-branded promotional campaign.

The “Love That Game” giveaway gives customers the opportunity to win big prizes, like a $15,000 “Home Theater/Home Tailgate Package,” which includes a 65” TV to watch the game, a check for buying a new couch, a wooden block stacking game like you’d see at a sports bar, a cornhole game for during halftime, a Bluetooth speaker, a cooler, tumblers, a football and a darts game. That’s a pretty darn good start to an impressive home game-day setup.

In addition to that grand prize, there’s a weekly giveaway for a $750 “Tailgate Gaming Package,” which includes the cornhole game, the wooden block game, a football and a speaker.

Finally, there’s the lower-level prize of $15-$100 promotional codes to Fanatics, so you can at least look the part on game day, even if your home theater isn’t at Hall of Fame-level yet.

The actual promotional campaign itself works sort of like McDonald’s Monopoly campaign, where customers who buy a medium drink from now until Oct. 26 will receive a promotional game piece with a code. They then enter that code on the Popeyes app, and they’ll be entered into the sweepstakes.

Based on the information we’ve seen so far, it seems like every game piece at least comes with some sort of prize, like free fries or a drink, access to virtual games on the app or more Fanatics discounts.

This is how a lot of brands are going to need to handle the absence of in-person sporting events. Pushing the idea of tailgating at home and creating an incentive to buy more fast food with prizes of souping up that home viewing experience makes sense.

It’s entirely possible that Popeyes had another plan for the NFL season, but had to—ahem—pivot to something that fit the current state of things a little better. It’s also a good way to use multiple promotional mediums—you have the games, tech items like the speaker, branded drinkware and the labels themselves. It encompasses a lot of different product categories.

Let’s just hope that it has a bit more integrity than the McDonald’s Monopoly game. Otherwise, we can look forward to watching the documentary a few years down the road in our stylish new home theater.

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