I spend a healthy majority of the year wearing a double layer rubber sole with a fully adjustable strap wrapped to my foot. In the mud. In the rain. Hiking. Biking. Working. Weddings. All the time. I wear my Chaco sandals everywhere! When I am forced, by the inevitable fear of wintery popsicle toes, to switch to boots I am still sporting a “Chaco tan” through the winter. I am proud to consider myself a part of what is known as the Chaco Nation where If I had to dictate Chaco’s value proposition I would say that Chacos are making footwear for ‘everyone doing anything’. Their homepage states that,
”Chaco creates premium footwear for the outdoor-minded because we believe life is enriched through adventure, travel, and community.”
I am but a single. not-so-humble, Chaco brand loyalist, so I took to the Twitter to see what others are saying about Chaco and what Chaco is saying about itself. Checking out the hashtag #ChacoNation produced a swath of tweets referencing a photo contest and sporting the tags #ChacoNation and #OutdoorNation. A deluge of young people posting pictures of their feet out adventuring. A contest? A gift card? I want in! So, I got distracted from my ‘research’ went down that rabbit hole. It turns out that Outdoor Nation is hosting the contest for students of participating colleges that are involved in being outdoor ambassadors for their campuses. Neither LBCC or OSU are participating, so I lost interest and returned to my initial mission, but I learned that this partnership promotion existed and that young people across the country were jazzed about it.
Returning to Twitter I decided to search out @ChacoUSA in conjunction with #Chaconation. I wondered if anyone else is feeling the pains of fall and getting ready to pack their beloved sandals away. Some were and either switched to Chaco brand hiking boots or took Chaco’s advice on the matter. Enter, #Sockos and I am redirected to Chaco’s instagram.
Challenge sandal wearing conforming norms! Wear your sandals with socks. What a stroke of marketing genius. If Chaco can just make it cool to wear your socks with your sandals more of us will spend more time in them. Ultimately, more people will notice because, let’s face it, everyone notices someone wearing socks with their sandals. And you are going to do something subversive in this hashtag, selfie, post everything digitally social world you should probably be proud of it…
Lastly, I took a closer look at #ChacoLife and was immediately surprised to see that of the first dozen tweets 5 of them were from other businesses or organizations, not including two of which were from @ChacoUSA. They included Plato’s Closet (@plclarksvilletn), Rearguard Gear (@rearguardgear), and campsaver.com (@campsaver) all promoting sales on Chaco products. Rad. This felt like a digital marketing dual back scratch! Another #Chacolife tweet begged the question every Chaco lover eventually faces which is to resole or not to resole and buy a new pair. I feel ya buddy, personally I resole and restrap whenever needed and get as many miles as I can off my two pair.
Ultimately, looking into @ChacoUSA was a lot of fun because of my affinity for their product and the fun vibe the collective #ChacoNation puts out into the world. I did not realize that was happening digitally as well as at our local SAGE summer concerts, farmers markets, etc. which is where I see my Chaco Nation brethren. If I were on the Chaco marketing team I would be inspired by all of this and keep riding the wave of positive energy. There is a lot of positive feedback and therefore healthy ‘word of mouth’ from the people whose mouths say the most and speak the loudest - the market.
PS - This review did not even touch #Chacotan. If you're interest is peaked... it is worth checking out the army of people tweeting and intstagramming photos of their feet.
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