How REI’s #OptOutside became so much more than a Black Friday moment.

Britton Hennessy
7 min readMar 18, 2016

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Black Friday has evolved a lot over the years.

I remember as a kid going to our favorite stores to pick up all of the sales pamphlets for the upcoming festivities. My mother and I would scan through, hunting for the best deals on the products we wanted. We would plan our trips from store to store. It was super tactical. Not even 10 years later, things are way different! I get emails months ahead of November with tailored ads and online “doorbuster” sales. What once was a few friendly people camping out together in parking lots became armies of shoppers rampaging through the aisles. Doorbuster sales that were aggressive but safe suddenly evolved into riots and assaults. And now, all of that is going away again. Now it’s shifting again, this time towards the digital realm. Now we see millions of Americans, clicking away on the web eagerly awaiting packages to arrive a mere two days later. Hopefully, things have become less barbaric.

Yet not matter the medium, we continue to throw away thousands of dollars to finally get that big TV “we were going to get eventually but now that it is on sale, absolutely can’t pass up.” We’ve created this culture where we isolate ourselves and say “Look at me! Look at me!” Driven by our consumerism and need for the new, we are in a constant battle with our egos striving to fulfill our happiness with shiny new things. But we know that doesn’t always work.

To be honest, material things often do bring us lots of happiness. I look at my shiny new motorcycle every day and think of all the adventures I’m going to experience because of it. I love it so much! I invest time and money into that bike because it’s a great source of joy for me. But everybody is different, and happiness can rise from an array of sources. It may be their loved ones, their careers, faith, hobbies, or sports. Then there are the outdoorsy people of the world. The shoppers of REI, Backcountry.com, The Clymb, and other outlets. For them, there is one thing that unites them in happiness: the love for the outdoors.

For outdoorsy men and women, the wilderness is a place of pure bliss. It provides tranquility, joy, and rest. These same people often despise consumerism, celebrity fandom, pop culture, and the general disorganization of the typical American way of life. REI knows this. Even as a retail company themselves, they created the ultimate counter-cultural movement to America’s all-consuming shopping machine.

We all know the story: in 2015, REI closed all of their stores on the biggest shopping day of the year to encourage people to go outdoors and experience our beautiful planet in its raw and natural form. #OptOutside was the most praised and most condemned conversation on the web for weeks. Was it a marketing ploy? Probably. Is it paying off long-term? Yes. Do we still love them and respect them for it? Most of us. But the campaign didn’t end the next day. #OptOutside grew to be something completely different than a Black Friday campaign.

Personally, I was thrilled to see REI making this move. I absolutely hate Black Friday and all it represents. I was so proud of the co-op for making the bold move to close their doors, risk sales and their reputation, all to remind their members what it is that really brings us joy. Where I normally felt isolated in the chaos of Black Friday, surrounded by insanity and never-ending traffic, I was reminded that I am not alone. There are millions of people like me that just want to get away.

It could not have been more than a few weeks later when I was reading an AMA on Reddit from Jerry Stritzke, President and CEO of REI, and saw how much Redditors truly despised the campaign. They tore REI to pieces, claiming #OptOutside to be “cheap, trashy, manipulative, and outright ridiculous.” The general stigma was that it was so obvious it was a marketing stunt and consumers could see right through it. They may have been right about that. No matter where the heart of the campaign comes from, it was still a business decision in the end. I am sure REI knew what they were doing. Not to mention that we as consumers don’t like to feel we are being manipulated through marketing. Even though, in a small way, that’s exactly what marketing is supposed to do.

Furthermore, Redditors used the AMA as a platform to complain about new employment policies, low pay, lack of benefits, and other problems people had been experiencing at the co-op. Reading through this, my stomach sank. I was so proud of the company for this move and wanted to commend them over and over for their generosity and loyalty to members. My faith in them was slowly being crushed.

#OptOutside went from a passionate and rooted movement to being a money-motivated campaign to drive sales. Of course, consumers reacted with the typical “Oh how dare they use a brilliant marketing ploy to make us want to buy things!” The campaign seemed to have fallen flat and nobody cared anymore.

Fast forward a few months to early 2016 and things have completely changed!

#OptOutside continues to be a national trend with thousands of Tweets, Instagram photos, and Facebook posts uploaded hourly to the conversation. People actually took it seriously and are opting outside all of the time! How did this massive shift happen?

What people misunderstood is REI did so much more than close their doors on the biggest shopping day of the year. REI created a platform for the voices of those who felt alone on Black Friday. People like me that live our daily lives despising our habits of consuming and just want to spend our free time away from society with those we love suddenly had a voice piercing through the white noise. The conversation stopped being about individualism and started being about community, uniting a dissonant and fragmented culture. In the social sphere, #OptOutside took all of my adventures and let me share them with others as passionate as myself. What REI did was not only innovative, it was necessary. There were hundreds of thousands of people needing community and they started it.

When I post to #OptOutside, I am contributing to a greater purpose.

I am representing my passion and love to all those out there to see. I look at their content and love seeing each and every person individually finding their passion and living it out! This is what I was looking for this entire time. I could buy all of the new jackets and beanies I want, but what really brings me joy is getting out and sharing my passion with the world. Through #OptOutside, we get the opportunity to inspire one another and REI gets to be the backbone holding it all together.

When it comes to some of the best branding campaigns of 2015, this one takes the gold medal because it was the one of the few that ever made it beyond the two-week viral period. We see dozens of incredible ads, campaigns, and buys that grab our undivided attention for a moment. Then they die and we go on to live our daily lives. Just take a quick second and try to recall some of the most viral moments in recent years. Remember Shia LeBeouf’s motivational speech? Katy Perry’s left shark? Kim Kardashian’s Paper Magazine cover? Oh! And don’t forget the blue and black dress! Or was it white and gold? I can’t remember.

The point is, viral content comes and goes, and brands often think to themselves, “If we can just go viral this year, then our sales will explode!” But that philosophy is shallow and short-sighted. A campaign can be as innovative and incredible as you want, but what makes a brand really stick is when you can bring people together to share a common passion. REI figured that out in 2015. When one brand says “Hey, let’s talk about me!” REI says “I want to hear about you.”

People don’t want to be spoken to, they want to be heard. Brands hardly ever get this right. Even when they try to listen they say “We hear you want a bigger TV, so we put one on sale!” But they are missing the entire point! People don’t want a bigger TV! They want you to recognize them. They are looking for validation. We don’t buy things for ourselves. We buy them for the acknowledgment of others.

Ultimately, brands need to take a lesson from REI. As the outdoor industry continues to become increasingly competitive year over year, REI found a way to stand out by bringing people together. That’s why we believe in them. We all know we can find a wider selection and better prices from other places, but when you are a member at REI, it’s more than just a retail store, it’s a community of people just like you. That’s what I am looking for. That and a new pair of hiking boots.

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Britton Hennessy
Britton Hennessy

Written by Britton Hennessy

Fan of too many things. Still trying to figure that out. UX Lead. University Teacher. Advocate for accessible and responsible design. www.brittonhennessy.com

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