Nerds, Part 1: Nerds as marketing tactic

Fashion kind of took a backseat for me during the pandemic, but in March, I decided to treat myself to a pair of breakup shoes, to start my new life as a single lady on the right feet! When they arrived, hiding out in the bottom of the box was none other than a sample pouch of Nerds® Gummy Clusters! Because, of course, what goes better with a pair of shoes than candy chews?

I was thrilled (to the teeth!) because Nerds are one of my favorite candies. Despite the incongruity of unsolicited sweets in my shoe shipment, I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth (not if I could put it in my mouth instead!).

When I had a chance to investigate my Nerds packet more closely, I noticed a QR code on the back of the card—but not just any QR code: specifically, a QR code with all the right angles softened just enough to evoke the blobby shape of Nerds candy or perhaps a gooey gummy. That visual trick definitely earned my respect, in a way that hasn't happened much since I graduated from design school in 2010. I guess it is only appropriate that after a decade, when I finally nerd out over design again, it's about a package of Nerds.

But the story gets sweeter. The QR code came with an invitation to "see the work Nerds have done. Get stories about inventions, teamwork & fun!" Never one to resist the siren song of a story, I scanned away! I was expecting some made-up cartoony tales meant to inspire kids, but what I got was a short tale about a real, (formerly) live human (John Walker, who I soon learned invented matches) — written in verse!

Well! If there were ever a marketing campaign designed to appeal directly to me, it would include candy, cute happy cartoon creatures, QR codes that subtly evoke said creatures, and a plethora of poetry with loose meter and slant rhyme! Oh, and it wouldn't hurt for it to be a celebration of nerds—because I've always considered myself to be one.

Or at least, I used to. Nowadays I'm not so sure. The question of whether I'm still a nerd or not consumed me so much that I decided I had to do some research on the subject. That took me so long and got so complex and gave me so much material that I could no longer justify putting it in the same blog post as my little ode to a cute candy-corporation campaign.

So here's where this one will end. Take some time to appreciate Nerds (the candy and the humans who inspired their name). The website and the rhyming stories are fun, and you might learn something! Go scan the blobby barcode above if you want to get there without typing. Marvel at the absolutely adorable cartoon mascots, and wonder, as I did, whether you can get them in stuffed animal form. (Answer: you can't, so maybe that's the marketing avenue the brand should take up next!)

And maybe, by the time you're done, I will have completed my investigation into the nuances of nerddom and published the second part of this essay. Maybe. But probably not!