Buffalo Wild Wings Lost a Big Bet on the Super Bowl–Was It Worth the Hype?

In 2019, Buffalo Wild Wings bet its chicken on the improbable: It promised that if the Super Bowl went into overtime it would offer free wings. It is something that has happened only once in over five decades. But five years after the country’s largest sports bar made that promise, Buffalo Wild Wings lost its bet. So for a few hours on Monday, it gave away free chicken wings. 

While Buffalo Wild Wings did not provide comment to Inc. on how well this promotion went, Anthony Salerno, an associate marketing professor at Vanderbilt University, warns that this is a bet not all businesses can make.

In general, he advises small businesses against this approach because the risks, he said, simply outweigh the potential benefits. The reward might not live up to the hype, or the brand might not be able to afford the promised reward. Nevertheless, if businesses still want to try an on-brand gimmick–which was the case for Buffalo Wild Wings, since it was a sports bar capitalizing on a major sports event–there are a few things to consider. 

Understand the public appeal of the improbable

Most improbable events involve luck, and, “people are fascinated by luck,” Salerno explains. It’s irrational, but a lot of people believe in it. And when there is luck, there is an element of wishful thinking. “Just in between the bet placed and the outcome, there’s this middle part that allows for all of this wishful thinking to happen,” Salerno says. ” It’s a way of enhancing the experience, whatever that might be.” He said this is largely why brands resort to this kind of promotion. It’s a way to add some fun to an already exciting game. 

Realize that winning against the odds doesn’t necessarily mean a win for the brand

Salerno cited Epic Insurance, a company in Indianapolis that promised a huge reward for an improbable event: putting a golf ball from one end of a basketball court into a hole at the other end 94 feet away. Last month, a college senior did just that during a basketball timeout. 

“You’ll notice it barely shows the logo on the video covering it. And even on the check itself, it’s just in the top left corner, where you’d have no idea of what that was, even if you saw it. It was just in general very easy to miss,” Salerno says. 

“That’s an example of a really improbable event occurring. It happens, and then it’s like they are spending all this money on this unlikely event and no one knows that they did it,” Salerno says. This brings Salerno to his point for any company that is considering such a gimmick–the brand can get lost in the excitement. Therefore, it is important to make sure that the company is consistently visible in the messaging, so that the public can associate the brand with the prize. 

Finally, manage expectations

Entrepreneurs should set specific standards for the reward so they don’t set themselves up to not be able to afford the payoff. Otherwise, what’s the worst thing that can happen? “The worst thing would just be somehow bound to whatever you committed to and it was so financially outrageous that it put your company in real peril. That would be the extreme.” Salerno said Buffalo Wild Wings did this correctly when it gave free chicken wings only on February 26 from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m., limiting it to dine-in and in-person carryout orders.

“Just managing expectations on what the reward would be [is] your best means of protection,” Salerno says. “Regardless of whether you are a large company or an entrepreneur, you don’t want to have to backtrack on something you committed to.”