If all your best relationships tend to start with a shared love of food, a temporary new dating site may just be for you. Delivery app Doordash (DASH) and burger chain Shake Shack (SHAK) partnered to launch a dating site for spicy food lovers during Valentine's Day.
Dubbed "Eat Cute," the limited-period dating site has people creating profiles based on how spicy they like their food: users add a selfie and a spice tolerance and are matched with someone who has a compatible love or dislike of spice.
DoorDash
How Spicy Do You Like It?
While the quick format makes it difficult to find a long-term partner with similar values (although you never know!), users who participate get a fun person to talk to as well as coupon for a free Buffalo Chicken Sandwich, which Shake Shack launched ahead of the Super Bowl as part of a limited-time promotion.
Eat Cute will be available from February 3 to 15 while DoorDash also enlisted TikTok influencers like Rahul Rai to promote both the dating site and the chance to win a $5,000 DoorDash gift card by sharing the campaign on Twitter (TWTR).
"This February, Shake Shack wants all our single fans to find love in a hopeless place - online," Shake Shack's Chief Marketing Officer Jay Livingston, said in a press statement. "By partnering with DoorDash for 'Eat Cute,' we are hoping to use our Buffalo Chicken Sandwich to light the initial spark and help singles everywhere spice up their dating experience."
A Marketing Gimmick That Just May Work?
Notoriously the day during which couples eat out and single people feel pressure to find love, Valentine's Day is a marketing opportunity for fast-food companies in particular — from California Pizza Kitchen's annual heart-shaped pizza menu to Yum! Brands (YUM) Kentucky Fried Chicken Chicken Sandwich Snuggler.
Shake Shack, in particular, is known to tailor menu items around the seasons and take holiday and special event marketing very seriously — along with the SuperBowl-themed buffalo chicken sandwich, it recently swapped out its Sugar Plum Fairy and Christmas Cookie shakes for springtime versions: some saw the "Wake And Shake" as a nod to April 20th and the cannabis community's term "wake and bake."
The site also comes at a time when most fast-food chains are trying to move more of their orders onto their app — Shake Shack, Taco Bell and Wendy's have all recently launched promotions exclusive to the app in an attempt to drive traffic there.
