Scotch, not coffee, may be the beverage of choice on “Mad Men,” the AMC cable series about the ‘60s-era advertising world. But Eight O’Clock Coffee launched its second branded tie-in with the series just before Sunday night’s debut of its third season, rolling out a set of branded e-cards using photos of the show’s characters.
Visitors to the Eight O’Clock Web site will find a link to “Mad Men e-cards” available only at the site. Located on a page that says they’re “Fueled by Eight O’Clock Coffee,” the cards can be customized with themes such as “birthday,” “viewing party” and “let’s coffee” and personalized with messages from the sender.
Senders need to give their e-mail address in order to mail the cards and are asked before sending if they wish to receive the Eight O’Clock Coffee newsletter, with an opt-in box already checked. After sending, they can return to either the Eight O’Clock Web site or to the AMCTV.com Web site set up for “Mad Men.”
The cards will be available through the show’s third season, which ends in November. They are being promoted in branded online ads on the AMCTV.com Web site and on the Eight O’Clock Coffee and “Mad Men” social media sites.
“People connect over coffee, they connect about ‘Mad Men,’ and they connect online,” Eight O’Clock senior brand manager Alisa Jacoby said in a release. “Now they can connect with all three at once.”
This is the third promotion Eight O’Clock Coffee has run around the new season of “Mad Men”. In July the brand began sponsoring a “Mad Men Yourself” microsite and application that lets users put together a screen avatar with the cartoon-retro look of the program’s setting.
Eight O’Clock also brands a “Mad Men” trivia quiz on the AMCTV.com Web site that matches players’ personalities with the series characters they most resemble.
While Eight O’Clock Coffee doesn’t figure in any of the show’s episodes so far—and in fact one show was built around coffee-brand rival Martinson—the company and its agency, S3, which is responsible for the avatar and e-card campaigns, maintain that the brand and the show are linked through synchronicity. According to the release, the 150-year-old Eight O’Clock brand “was as popular in the 1960s ‘Mad Men’ time period as it is today.”
Network
