7-Elevens Become Simpsons 'Kwik-E-Marts'

7-Eleven Inc. turned 6,000-plus stores in North America into Kwik-E-Marts, the fictional convenience stores in "The Simpsons." The latest example of marketers using 'we can laugh at ourselves" marketing is receiving smiles and offering Squishees instead of Slurpes. The temporary 'Kwik-E-Marts' will sell items that until now existed only on television: Buzz Cola, KrustyO's cereal and the slushy drink knockoff of Slurpees (Squishees).

The 'Kwik-E-Marts (temporary) renovation is all part of the movie campaign hype and loves to lampoon 7-Eleven as a store that sells all kinds of unhealthy snacks. The movie opens July 27th and I may see the movie based on the cool 'Kwik-E-Marts stunt alone.

7-Eleven has contracted with manufacturers of similar products to make their Kwik-E-Mart counterparts. Malt-O-Meal, the cereal maker, will conjure up a recipe for KrustyO's, for example. Other products will simply be renamed. One flavor of 7-Eleven's own Slurpee will be sold as "WooHoo! Blue Vanilla" Squishee for the month.

The stunt is a cheap way to call attention to their movie, since 7-Eleven is bearing all the costs. They're hoping the kwik E Mark shows the omnipresent chain has a quality rarely seen in other corporations — the ability to laugh at themselves.

"We thought if you really want to do something different, the idea of actually changing stores into Kwik-E-Marts was over the top but a natural," said Bobbi Merkel, an executive for of 7-Eleven's advertising agency, FreshWorks, a unit of Omnicom Group Inc. "It shows they get the joke."

The month long promotion has been rumored for a long while but was able to keep spoilers at bay until the stores were ready for their Kwik makeover.

The U.S. locations where a 7-Eleven store was transformed into a Kwik-E-Mart are:

• New York City
• Chicago, Illinois
• Dallas, Texas
• Denver, Colorado
• Burbank, California
• Los Angeles, California - 7-11 at Venice and Sepulveda in Los Angeles, CA
  
• Henderson, Nevada
• Orlando, Florida
• Mountain View, California
• Seattle, Washington
• Bladensburg, Maryland

Controversy?

Kwik E Mart is run by a man with a thick Indian accent so the promotion was not entirely risk-free. The proprietor of Kwik-E-Mart is Apu who speaks in a heavy Indian accent. He is based on a manager Matt Groening encountered while shopping at a 7-Eleven in Los Angeles nearly 20 years ago and plays to stereotypes about convenience-store employees and Asian immigrants.

While many of 7-Eleven's franchisees are Indian, Rita Bargerhuff, a 7-Eleven marketing executive said they were "overwhelmingly positive" after hearing of the Kwik-E-Mart idea, but still "it was not a 100 percent endorsement."

"There was definitely a concern of offending people," she said. "But they seemed to understand that 'The Simpsons' makes fun of everybody. The vast majority saw this as a great opportunity."

Kumar Assandas, a Las Vegas 28-year-old franchisee whose parents immigrated from India is one of the temporary Kwik-E-Marts.
"I know it's a stereotype, but it doesn't bother me. Everybody knows it's a joke," Assandas said. "I'm a big Simpsons fan myself, and maybe subconsciously it even inspired me to become a 7-Eleven owner."