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Journal of Marketing Management

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The branded carnival: the dark magic of consumerexcitement

Stephen R. O’Sullivan

To cite this article: Stephen R. O’Sullivan (2016): The branded carnival: the dark magic ofconsumer excitement, Journal of Marketing Management

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2016.1161656

Published online: 11 Apr 2016.

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The branded carnival: the dark magic of consumerexcitementStephen R. O’Sullivan

Department of Management & Marketing, Cork University Business School, University College Cork, Cork,Ireland

ABSTRACTThis ethnography outlines experiences of the marketer-facili-tated World Series of Beer Pong. Consumers, in carnival spirit,augment marketer-facilitated mimetic (moderate, controlled)forms of experience with non-mimetic (dangerous, uncon-trolled) consumption rituals, enacted in pursuit of contemporaryexcitement. Consumers serendipitously hijack the facilitatingbrand’s ideology resulting in the promotion of marketplacetensions. This study contributes to marketing and consumerculture theory by extending current experiential marketing fra-meworks via the introduction of the branded carnival, a non-mimetic communal brand-centric phenomenon; showing hownon-mimetic excitement emerges in marketplace contexts; high-lighting the implications for experiential and brand communitymarketers; and positioning the branded carnival within abroader cultural gravitation towards non-mimetic behaviouropposing marketplace ideology. Finally, limitations are dis-cussed, and directions for further research are suggested.Readers are encouraged to engage with carnival spirit: profa-nities go uncensored.

ARTICLE HISTORYReceived 18 September 2015Accepted 18 February 2016

KEYWORDSBrandfest; carnival;consumer excitement;marketplace tension;experiential marketing;brand hijack; brandcommunity

Consumers have always desired an experience economy (Sherry, Kozinets, & Borghini,2007). The consumer desire for experience is complex and often driven by existentialneeds for authenticity, self-expansion, and freedom (Leigh, Peters, & Shelton, 2006;Lyng, 2012), rather than what marketers consider entertainment. Capitalist society isa theatre of desire: consumer experience is directed by a system of hedonism,pleasures, and fantasies (Carù & Cova, 2007; Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982).However, within capitalist society, strong mechanisms of social control serve toregulate the experience of mystery, magic, passion, and soul (Firat & Venkatesh,1995), limiting the human expression of extreme emotion (Elias & Dunning, 1986).As a result, contemporary pleasure seeking becomes not so much a state of beingbut a quality of experience, induced by the submission to emotions that excite(Kozinets et al., 2004).

CONTACT Stephen R. O’Sullivan stephenosullivan@ucc.ie Room 2.60, O’Rahilly Building, Department ofManagement & Marketing, Cork University Business School, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland

JOURNAL OF MARKETING MANAGEMENT, 2016http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2016.1161656

© 2016 Westburn Publishers Ltd.

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However, it is argued that contemporary consumer experience lacks any greatquality of depth or originality (Baudrillard, 1998): the magical sparks of excitement,which once inspired spontaneous paroxysms, abound with ecstatic irrationalities,have been doused by the disenchanting nature of the structured market (Firat &Venkatesh, 1995). Marketers, as a diminished substitute, stage thematic,commercially approved, consumption experiences – typified by the ‘brandfest’phenomenon (McAlexander & Schouten, 1998). The consumers outlined in thisstudy, pococurante of marketer-controlled excitements, augment brandfestexperiences with more deviant consumption rituals to satisfy their contemporaryquest for excitement, pleasure, and freedom. Some consumers seek experiences,which are less comfortable, less predictable, but more dangerous and exciting(Lyng, 1990, 2005; Murphy & Patterson, 2011; Tumbat & Belk, 2011). Consumersare capricious and creative but also deviant and destructive (Gabriel & Lang, 1995;Reith, 2005), the latter traits provide heightened emotional experiences and greatermarketplace excitements (Kavanagh, Keohane, & Kuhling, 2011), yet remain under-researched in marketing and consumer research (Fitchett & Smith, 2002). This studyinvestigates deviant consumption experiences in order to provide novel insightsinto the contemporary quest for excitement, and in doing so, extends currentexperiential marketing frameworks to incorporate the communal practice ofextreme and dangerous brand-centric consumption rituals.

Brandfests and consumer excitement

For some time now, marketers have created spectacular-themed environmentsintended to excite consumers into supplementary consumption (McAlexander,Schouten, & Koenig, 2002; Schmitt, 1999; Sherry et al., 2007). Marketer-facilitatedbrand celebrations have hitherto been termed ‘brandfests’ (McAlexander & Schouten,1998), defined as marketer-controlled, extraordinary events, provided for customersto celebrate brand ownership/consumption, with the intent of stimulating long-termbrand loyalty (McAlexander & Schouten, 1998). McAlexander and Schouten (1998)suggest that marketers should provide brandfest participants with opportunities forpersonal growth, help manage perceived risks (social, financial, physical, etc.), andfacilitate a sense of community among them. Brandfest events appear remarkablyefficient as a brand community-building activity due to their potential for inspiringfeelings of ‘communitas’ (Turner, 1979) and providing participants with access to‘transcendent customer experiences’ (Schouten, McAlexander, & Koenig, 2007).Ritualised brand-intensive celebrations foster the emergence of a communalidentity and concretise consumer–consumer–brand relationships (Muñiz & O’Guinn,2001), which can lead to brand community formation (O’Sullivan, Richardson, &Collins, 2011).

Despite the consumer culture theory (CCT) literature casting consumers as ‘doubleagents’, ‘plunderers’, and ‘pirates’ (Cova, Kozinets, & Shankar, 2007), marketplace cultureresearch has paid less attention to deviant communal consumption rituals –transgressive behaviours related to the pursuit of existential needs (Lyng, 2012).McAlexander et al.’s (2002) customer-centric model of brand community suggests thatbrandfests provide participants with opportunities to enhance their relationships with

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the product, brand, marketer, and fellow consumers. However, McAlexander et al. (2002)exclude from their model consumers’ relationships with themselves, which has limitedthe exploration of additional existential needs central to communal brand consumption(Leigh et al., 2006), the pursuit of which, may come at the cost of other marketplacerelationships, particularly, a harmonious community–marketer relationship, which will beoutlined in this paper.

The CCT literature views consumption as a co-productive venture: an amalgamationof marketplace resources augmented with consumer creativity (Cova et al., 2007;Kozinets et al., 2004), in which consumers actively engage with the marketer tocontribute positively to the market (Cova & Dalli, 2009; Kozinets, Hemetsberger, &Schau, 2008). While the CCT literature extols the advantages of giving an element ofcreative latitude to the consumer (Cova & Cova, 2002; Schau, Muñiz, & Arnould, 2009),consumer practices can cannibalise marketers’ attempts at evolving a brand (Cova &Pace, 2006; Hayward & Yar, 2006; Wipperfürth, 2005). Consumers can take control of abrand’s evolution, or ideology, by hijacking the production of brand narratives and/orappropriating products/services with alternative meanings (Cova & Pace, 2006; Muñiz &Schau, 2007), generally motivated by passion for, rather than antagonism towards,brands (Cova & Fuschillo, 2013). Nonetheless, brand hijacking highlights the degree towhich consumers are prone to defining brand ideology, and the ethos of consumption,irrespective of marketers’ visions (Cova & White, 2010; O’Sullivan et al., 2011).

Brand-centric celebrations are not only a marketer-initiated phenomenon, onoccasion, fanatical consumers organise brand celebrations, aside from direct marketercontrol or influence (Cova et al., 2007). Tensions can arise in the marketer–communityrelationship concerning the organisation of, and ethos central to, both official andunofficial brandfests (O’Sullivan et al., 2011). While marketers stage brandfests withthe end goal of maximising profit through consumer enjoyment (McAlexander et al.,2002), they typically wish to achieve marketing objectives in ways that reflect brandideology favourably (Fournier & Lee, 2009). However, marketers rarely, if ever, considerthe deeper existential needs and excitement desires that stimulate communal brandcelebration, desires which may be incompatible with marketing objectives (O’Sullivanet al., 2011). Despite operating in the realm of ‘anti-structure’,1 the marketer-controlledenvironment of the brandfest typically belongs to the ‘mimetic class’ of excitement (Elias& Dunning, 1986). Mimetic excitement is socially and personally without extreme formsof danger, whereas, during non-mimetic excitements people are liable to lose controland potentially become a threat, or danger, to themselves and/or others (Elias &Dunning, 1986). The term mimetic is used not in the most literal sense meaningimitation: mimetic events are not representations of everyday structured life events,rather, the emotions expressed and the affects aroused are imitative of those experiencedin everyday structured society. Brandfests mimic the emotions, and affects, embedded instructured society, only transposed in more spectacular cladding. Marketer-controlledleisure activities generally form an enclave for the socially approved arousal of moderateexcitement (Reith, 2005; Santoro & Troilo, 2007).

Contemporary life has been brought under increasingly stricter control, as havepeoples’ passions, expressions, and excitements (Beck, 1992; Giddens, 2001; Lyng,2012): restraint is imposed upon the spontaneous and unreflective excitement foundin joy and sorrow, in love and hatred, and the extremes of the powerful and passionate

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(Elias & Dunning, 1986). Consumers are caught in a unique historical juncture betweenmodernity’s legacy of asceticism and self-control and postmodernity’s increasingemphasis on hedonism and personal gratification (Reith, 2005) – consumers veerbetween the experiential extremes of cultural dupes (or dopes) and heroes ofconsumption (Bauman, 2007). Capitalist society entices people to loose control, togive in to frenzy, but not too much. The degrees of control consumers enact, evenwithin their leisure time, have become automatic: their control is no longer under theircontrol but built into their routinised personality structure (Goulding, Shankar, & Elliott,2002).

Elias and Dunning (1986) suggest that at the heart of leisure enjoyment is not onlythe release from tensions but also the production of tensions. The production of tensionsis an essential component of human ontological and existential makeup (Caillois, 1962;Huizinga, 1955). However, the CCT literature generally discusses tensions in a negativelight (Cova & Pace, 2006; Cova & White, 2010; Maclaran & Brown, 2005) and works tosolve, or resolve, marketplace tensions (Cova et al., 2007; Cova & Pace, 2006; Richardson,2013; Tumbat & Belk, 2011), ignoring, to a degree, the existential benefits disruptive andnon-mimetic behaviour may arouse in consumers (Lyng, 2012). The co-production ofperiodic tensions could potentially help achieve marketing goals; tension, after all, is anessential component of consumer consumption narratives (Arnould & Price, 1993; BoydThomas & Peters, 2011; Celsi, Rose, & Leigh, 1993; Hickman & Ward, 2007; Kozinets et al.,2004; Tumbat & Belk, 2011).

If marketplace experiences, such as brandfests, fail to produce adequate tensions, the‘tonus’2 of the experience will be too low, and thus unexciting. For some consumers,marketer-approved and controlled consumption experiences can lack tonus. Consumers’bespoke consumption rituals, however, unbound by marketer sanctioning, canincorporate darker, more deviant, elements, serving to establish tonus (Hickman &Ward, 2007; O’Sullivan et al., 2011; Schouten & McAlexander, 1995). Brandmanagement tend to display apprehension towards consumer-initiated rituals, whichescalate the more controlled, sanitised, sense of excitement characterised by brandfests(O’Sullivan et al., 2011). While brandfests are effective at satisfying consumer desires fortranscendence and sociality (Canniford, 2011; Schouten et al., 2007), consumers seek outa broad range of marketplace experiences. The increase in organised festivals (Maclaran& Brown, 2005; Maffesoli, 1996); carnivalesque servicescapes (Belk, 2000; Langer, 2007;Sherry et al., 2007); illicit servicescapes (Goulding, Shankar, Elliott, & Canniford, 2009);dystopian-themed environments (Podoshen, Venkatesh, & Jin, 2014) and dark tourism(Dalton, 2014); the emergent culture of intoxication (Cocker, Banister, & Piacentini, 2012;Hackley et al., 2013); and popularity of dangerous edgework practices (Cronin, McCarthy,& Collins, 2014; Murphy & Patterson, 2011; O’Sullivan, 2015; Van Hout & Hearne, 2014)suggest that consumers desire a range of consumption experiences, which are notmimetic, but more carnivalesque and less controlled in nature. Consumers appear tobe gravitating towards non-mimetic consumption experiences.

Within the marketplace, mimetic excitements are prone to escalate to non-mimeticexcitements (Elias & Dunning, 1986; Kavanagh et al., 2011): the excitements of ‘BlackFriday’ shoppers can escalate to dangerous frenzy and criminality (Boyd Thomas &Peters, 2011), the emotional outburst of football fans, can escalate to hooliganism, forinstance (Armstrong & Giulianotti, 2002). The frenzy of non-mimetic consumption has

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the potential to escalate behaviours in commercially controlled environments (O’Sullivanet al., 2011; Treadwell, Briggs, Winlow, & Hall, 2012). Thus, it is believed that marketplacebrand-centric celebrations are not confined to the mimetic brandfest. Therefore, inattempting to extend the understanding of communal brand-centric consumption andconsumers’ tendency to gravitate towards non-mimetic marketplace experiences, thetransgressive carnival lens is adopted.

The carnival and the marketplace

Communal, hedonic, and transgressive festivities have been performed by culturesthroughout recorded history (Caillois, 1959/2001, 1962; Kavanagh et al., 2011; Turner,1979, 1982). The first recorded carnival was the Egyptian festival of Osiris; a designated‘time out of time’, where behavioural codes outside the socially accepted norm could beperformed, representing a celebration of birth, death, and rebirth. The Greek festival ofDionysus, though mythologically complex, had at the heart of its celebration excess inthe form of drinking, feasting, violence, and ecstatic physical performances (Presdee,2000). In ancient Rome the two festivals3 of Kalends and Saturn are also recorded asperformances of excess and transgression. Festivities of magical, and social ritual, ofworship and subversion, pleasure and violence, existed as a core in many cultures acrossthe world (Caillois, 1959/2001). The Church initially attempted to challenge carnival ritesbut the momentum of popular belief made eradication, or full metamorphosis,impossible (Caillois, 1959/2001). By the Middle Ages, the carnival had found its wayinto the calendar of the Church, involving congregations and clergy in rites of excessand reversal, in processions, feasts, and performances of disorder that ritualisticallymocked the sanctimonious authority of the Church (Thompson, 2007). Transgressivecommunal performances have a historical permanency and existential necessity (Caillois,1959/2001).

The exhilaration of carnival is opposed to structured life: the latter concerned withdaily tasks and a system of taboos, whereas the former ‘eminently favour the creationand contagion of an exalted state that exhausts itself in cries and movement and that isincited to uncontrollably abandon itself to the most irrational impulses’ (Caillois, 1959/2001, p. 97). The archaic carnival was a time of festive excess, during which, pleasureswere foregrounded in opposition to the dominant, socially accepted, values of restraintand sobriety, providing a structure of myth while articulating the cultural vision of orderand disorder (Presdee & Carver, 2000; Thompson, 2007; Turner, 1979). Activities of thecarnival transmute the regular world to the ‘world-upside-down’ (Presdee, 2000);whereby Bakhtin (1965/1984) maintains ‘the fool is king’! Carnival is full of irrational,deranged, and offensive behaviour, ‘carnivalistic life’ with magical efficacy, sanctionsexciting behaviours, which in the structured world would be considered unacceptable,dangerous, or even criminal (Bakhtin, 1965/1984; Presdee, 2000).

Carnival is a ‘second life’, a celebration of subversion, becoming, and renewal (Hanlon,2006; Thompson, 2007; Turner, 1982), a cultural paroxysm, which purifies and renewssociety – not only from an existential, or ideological, perspective but also from aneconomic view point. Economics, accumulation, and moderation define the rhythm ofstructured life (Reith, 2005), whereas prodigality and excess characterise the carnival: anexalting melody of sacred life, which intervenes, disrupts, but restores (Caillois, 1959/

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2001). Carnival performances provide essential catharsis from the pressures of existence– discussed as an existential renaissance (Caillois, 1959/2001; Turner, 1979, 1982).However, the transgressive excitements of carnivalistic life are not all assumed to bepositive – in the ecstatic acts of carnival, damage is done, and people are hurt (Presdee &Carver, 2000).

The carnival, as depicted in the writings of Bakhtin (1965/1984), is characterised by fourelements: eccentricity, profanities, suspension of hierarchies, and an emotion bond (Torn,2012). With regard to eccentricity, the carnival permits and encourages the sensuous, latentside, of human nature to be expressed abundantly – excessive consumption, elaboratecostumes, and sexual debauchery orchestrate the frenzy (Torn, 2012). There is no shameheld in eating, drinking, vomiting, excreting, dancing, singing, profaning, and copulating toexcess (Thompson, 2007). Profanities and expressions beyond the bounds of ordinarymorality are observed in the carnival’s obscene imagery and language, blasphemies, andparodies: ‘the carnival is not afraid of the arse hole, the prick or cunt’ (Presdee & Carver, 2000,p. 39). Profanities are not intended to insult but rather to unify participants, to ground them.Carnival profanities hold a mirror to society, reflecting its inequalities and injustices: puttingforth an argument by inverting and critiquing structured life (Presdee, 2000; Turner, 1979).The suspension of hierarchies and associated social etiquette allows those previouslyseparated by social standings to enter into familiar contact. Carnivals are unisex (Martin,Schouten, & McAlexander, 2006) – all participants equal and temporarily anonymous canparticipate fully in the transgressions. For instance, in Babylon during the Sacaen festivaleach family dressed a slave as a king to rule over the household (Langdon, 1924). Thecarnival is a space where new relationships are established. The emotional bond orchestratesfree thoughts and inspires novel experiences; everything is brought together, high and low,sacred and profane, the wise and the stupid, through ridicule, mockery, and satire. Carnivalfrenzy can inspire ‘communion’ (Gurvitch, 1941). Communion possesses the highestintensity and depth of sociality – a flash of collective ecstasy, which is generally absentfrom structured social life (1941). While communitas is about the ‘being together’,communion is about the ‘doing together’ (Turner, 1979). People ‘do’ carnival (Kozinets,2002; Presdee & Carver, 2000).

While the suspension of hierarchies and emotional bond among consumers are frequentlydocumented in the marketplace culture literature (Cova et al., 2007), non-mimeticeccentricities and profanities remain under-explored, despite their ubiquity. There hasalways been a peculiar relationship between commercial exchange and extreme forms ofbehaviour: Playful, destructive, and often, deranged behaviours become a lucrative target formarket appropriation andmanipulation (Goulding et al., 2009; Grayson, 1999). Marketers haveutilised the carnival as a form and a metaphor (Brown, Stevens, & Maclaran, 1999; Maclaran,Brown, & Stevens, 1999; Presdee & Carver, 2000), providing commoditised carnival-likeexperiences, in a variety of marketplace contexts (Langer, 2007; Sherry et al., 2007).Marketers transport a diluted carnival ethos, a sort of marketer-controlled demi-frenzy,epitomised by the brandfest phenomenon (McAlexander & Schouten, 1998). Brandfests,and other spectacular thematic experiences (Kozinets et al., 2004; Peñaloza, 1999), may bepositioned as carnivalesque and/or utilise carnival imagery, but lack the non-mimeticexcitements foundational to the archaic carnival. Commercial processes have supressed thecarnival in its authentic state (Presdee & Carver, 2000); themarketer-facilitated carnival has lostthe transgressive and non-mimetic elements central to existential renaissance. Consumers no

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longer participate in ‘carnival’ once or twice a year but participate in multiple commercialcarnivals per year – seeking the existentially elusive (Presdee & Carver, 2000). However, theinnate human need for deviance, transgression, and the production of tensions, cannot bequelled:madness emerges in marketplace contexts (Kavanagh et al., 2011). Thus, in seeking toexplore the darker side of communal consumption experiences the following researchquestions are asked: (1) How does non-mimetic excitement emerge during a marketer-facilitated brandfest? (2) How does non-mimetic excitement influence the community–marketer relationship? (3) What is the cultural significance of non-mimetic marketplaceexcitements?

The study

Research context: the World Series of Beer Pong

Beer pong is recognised as one of the most popular party drinking games playedthroughout the United States (Borsari, 2004). Beer pong typically involves two teams,two players per team, a table, and ping-pong balls that are thrown into two triangleformations of 10 cups, slightly filled with beer, on each end of the table. Once a ball is‘sunk’ in an opponent’s cup that cup is removed from the game, and the beer drunk.Victory is achieved when all an opponent’s cups are removed (for a visual introductionto beer pong please see O’Sullivan (2013): https://vimeo.com/68964629). Manyuniversities in the United States, and even some cities and towns, have banned beerpong as a result of the debasing behaviour it encourages in male and female players(Ebright, 2010; Hider, 2013).

There are two types of beer pong: the party/bar drinking game, and ‘professional’ beerpong. During drinking games alcohol consumption is mandatory (Borsari, 2004), however,during ‘professional’ beer pong alcohol consumption is optional. Professional beer pongemerged in January 2006, when the BPONG brand organised the first World Series of BeerPong (WSOBP) in Las Vegas. BPONGmerchandises official standardised BPONG tables, balls,cups, clothing, and other novelty items: annual revenue estimated at $3 million (Eells,2010). By 2011, the WSOBP (VI) had evolved into an international BPONG brand celebrationwith over 1000 participants from the United States; Canada; Ireland; Mexico; Japan;Netherlands; Australia; Britain; Austria; Italy; and Germany, attending the ‘World Series’,and competing for the $50,000 grand prize (O’Sullivan & Richardson, 2013).

The WSOBP is held (during this research) in the ballroom of the iconic Flamingo Hotel andCasino from 1 January to 5 January. Inside the ballroom are three playing areas of 34 tableseach, each area sectioned off with metal barriers, with ample space for spectators, typicallymade up of participants who are momentarily not competing, and fans who have paidadmission to watch ($20 a day/$50 for the weekend). A DJ plays loud rap and hip-hop musicfrom the stage/announcement area. There are two bars, a food stall, BPONG merchandiseshop, and commercial vendors (please see Figure 1 for the WSOBP spatial map).

Research design

The emergent design ethnography began when the author attended WSOBP V, from 30December 2009 to 7 January 2010. To quote Lofland and Lofland (1995, p. 3), ‘the

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epistemological foundation of field studies is indeed the proposition that only throughdirect experience can one accurately know much about social life’, thus, the authorimmersed fully in the WSOBP experience, which included a significant lack of sleep,alcohol consumption, and the highs and lows of the WSOBP experience. However, thedual approach, as suggested by Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw (2001) was employed to gaina holistic understanding of consumer experience; a balance was struck between non-participative observation and conducting alternative field visits with an emphasis onmaximising immersive experience. The author adopted a ‘complete member role’(Stewart, 1998) in the BPONG community for over 36 months.

Investigating the extreme experience of WSOBP V (2010), VI (2011), and VII (2012)required a hybrid ethnographic approach, which included participant and non-participant observation (Stewart, 1998), autoethnography (Schouten & McAlexander,1995), informal conversations (Lofland & Lofland, 1995), five long interviews(McCracken, 1988), and visual ethnography (Pink, 2006), in the form of producing andanalysing photographs and video (Kozinets & Belk, 2007); multiple modes of datacollection promotes veracity (Stewart, 1998). The study of cultural artefacts, in theform of documentaries, newspapers, magazines, and video reports supplementedinsights obtained from field research. This study also employed a ‘netnography’(Kozinets, 2015) of the BPONG.COM forum, Facebook groups, and consumer blogs,which served particularly useful for investigating the historical development of theWSOBP, the emergence of the BPONG brand community, and the community–marketer relationship. The flux in the community–marketer relationship, resulting fromthe excitements of the WSOBP, could not have been observed without a longitudinalethnographic and netnographic combination.

Besides the WSOBP, the author participated in five BPONG-facilitated WSOBPqualifying tournaments (moderate compared to the WSOBP), and numerous unofficialbeer pong events in bars throughout New York, Boston, Detroit, Ann Arbor, andChicago, during a 3-week ethnographic fieldtrip, conducted in July 2010. In June 2011,the author also attended a competing brand’s (World Pong Tour) WSOBP equivalent,

DJ STAGE & ANNOUNCEMENTS

PLAYING AREA 1

ENTRANCE

BAR BAR

FLAMINGO HOTEL & CASINO

COMMERCIAL VENDORS

PLAYING AREA 2PLAYING AREA 3

STANDINGS SCREENSTAFF TABLE

SECURITY CHECK

FOO

D

FEMALE TOILET

BPON

G M

ERCH

AN

DISE

MALE TOILET

SMOKING AREA

Figure 1. WSOBP spatial layout.

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consisting of a 1-week ethnographic fieldtrip, which took place in Montreal,Philadelphia, and primarily, Atlantic City. To ensure the investigation adopted a multi-sited international aspect, simultaneously, the author conducted a 24-monthethnography of the BPONG Ireland community and participated in the BPONG-sponsored Dutch Series of Beer Pong, Venlo, Netherlands, in October 2011. The 36-month multi-sited ethnography yielded over 250 single-spaced pages of field notes, 60pages of netnographic observations, 30 pages of interview transcripts, over 2000photographs, and 30 hours of video.

The comprehensive data set was analysed manually according to the extensiveguidelines suggested by Spiggle (1994). Ethnographic field notes were analysed inthree stages: following extensive write-up of jotted field notes post WSOBP events;3–6 months later, serving to manufacture distance from the author’s personalfeelings and emotions following the WSOBP experience; and a final analysis afterleaving the field. All data were categorised by coding specific units of data on thebasis of its coherent meaning. Following initial categorisation, empirically groundedcodes were then abstracted into higher-order conceptual constructs and comparedwithin, and across, data types (Spiggle, 1994). For example, ‘binge drinking’, ‘alcohol-related illness’, and ‘illicit consumption’ were abstracted to the higher-order code‘carnival excess’. Inference was informed by iteration between the comprehensivedata set and the carnival conceptual lens. The analysis of visual data, in addition tocategorisation and abstraction, paid attention to four key areas (Pink, 2006): thecontext in which the image was produced; the content of the image; the contextsin and subjectivities through which images are viewed; and the materiality andagency of images.

The branded carnival

The ‘World Series’ is a rollercoaster of emotion, up-down-back-forth-distortive but incrediblyuplifting. The highs are high, and many, and vastly overshadow the physical and psycho-logical comedown experienced days afterwards. The ‘World Series’ has a powerful appeal,excitements to which, I was converted quickly – the waving mass of active and colourfulbodies, booming music, wild laughter, aggressive trash talk and arguments, camaraderieand lasting friendships, scant regard for sleep or health, and unreflective hedonic abandon,primarily in the form of extreme alcohol consumption, gambling, and debauchery, whichcoexist in contrast to the seriousness of the tournament – the sport – grown men andwomen dejectedly crying and storming off in tantrums following elimination from thetournament – the low of the experience, matched only by the harrowing journey home.The ‘World Series’ is an extreme consumption spectacle that I haven’t experienced prior, orsince. – Author’s account of the WSOBP

The WSOBP possesses a certain type of magic – the dark magic of non-mimeticexcitement. Magic, so enchanting, it inspires brand loyalty, evangelism, and thereification of a global brand community (O’Sullivan, 2013), but a dark element, sobewitching, it conjures unmanageable dangerous consumption, brand hijacking, andthe promotion of marketplace tensions. Prior to elaborating on the magical efficacy ofthe WSOBP to arouse excitement, the components and characteristics of the WSOBPbranded carnival are outlined (Table 1).

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Co-creating carnivalistic life: establishing eccentricities

From its inception the WSOBP encouraged extraordinary behaviour (Lindsay, 2008):BPONG utilised carnivalesque imagery and language to position the WSOBP, whileencouraging eccentricities, which participants emphatically co-created:

If I were to spend my money on a new car, could I really drive that car around wearing adiaper? If I were to spend my money on a trip to the Bahamas, could I really walk aroundthe Bahamas in a diaper? No! But when I spend my money on the WSOBP, I know that I canshow up and wear a diaper and be accepted. – ‘Martin4’, Last Cup: The Road to the WSOBP,Lindsay (2008).

It was an amazing experience. . . I never had anything like that, the amount of fun. . .everyone is just crazy. . . an amazing experience. – ‘Ed’, Male (22), Interview, January 6, 2011.

The above quotes, from ‘Martin’ and ‘Ed’, encapsulate the excitements and affectualappeal of the WSOBP. Both participants highlight the anti-structure ethos central to theWSOBP. ‘Martin’ compares the WSOBP to other consumption experiences, which fail tooffer novel excitements, or arouse behavioural codes beyond the socially acceptable.‘Ed’ suggests WSOBP participants are unified in ‘crazy’ behaviours, which contributed tohis novel ‘amazing experience’. Following the success of WSOBP I (2006), BPONG beganco-creating the WSOBP experience with its emerging brand community:

We [BPONG] want you to have fun here and if there is anything we can do for you guys letus know. . . [we’ll] bend over backwards to make sure you guys have the time of your lives. –B____ (BPONG), WSOBP II, 2007, Last Cup: Road To The World Series of Beer Pong, Lindsay(2008).

If you have a suggestion or idea for the WSOBP, please post it here. . . The idea here is to geta list going of what people want and/or don’t want in the event. Think of it as youropportunity to vote. – D____ (BPONG), posting in BPONG.COM Forum, August 13, 2007.

The official invitations to co-create the WSOBP experience resulted in the developmentof a utopian service space (Maclaran & Brown, 2005), where predominantly maleconsumers could enact ideals of atavistic masculinity (Holt & Thompson, 2004),centred on alcohol consumption, competition, and enacting the ‘male gaze’ (Patterson& Elliott, 2002). However, as the WSOBP evolved, the women as entertainment ethossubsided as more women participated fully in the carnival: carnival joy is unisex.5

The main WSOBP event opens at 10 am on 2 January and begins like traditionalsporting spectacles do: an opening speech and pageantry symbolise the sanctity of theofficial beginning of the carnival (Sherry et al., 2007; Turner, 1979). Contemporary

Table 1. Components and characteristics of the WSOBP branded carnival.Component Characteristics

Co-creating carnivalistic life: establishingeccentricities

Music, costumes, jerseys, flags, storytelling

Emotional bond: carnival communion Communion, long-term friendships, evangelismCarnival excess: non-mimetic consumption Abnormal alcohol consumption, edgework, severe health risksEstablishing tonus: the delight in beingdeviant

Verbal abuse, grotesque team names, exposing the body,destruction, upsetting the public

Exit through the carnival: Lentenconsumption and marketplace tensions

Existential renaissance, frugality and abstinence, replenishment,tensions in community–marketer relationship

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consumer carnivals do not (cannot) spontaneously erupt (Presdee, 2000), the designatedspace needs to be transformed via purification ritual:

BPONG’s opening speech emphasised respecting everyone involved. . . they played the USAnational anthem, everyone (that knew the words) was singing along. D___ (BPONG) finishedwith ‘Ladies and gentlemen – IT IS TIME!’ The buzzer sounded, cheers erupted and themusic started booming. . . there was an obvious sharp up-tempo change in atmosphere. –Field Notes, WSOBP VI, January 2, 2011.

Once the rite is performed, the carnival is free to build to its apogee. WSOBP participantsaccess the world-upside-down ethos through acts of ‘ludic autotely’ (Sherry et al., 2007).WSOBP participants wear colourful and extraordinary costumes intended to entertain:

People really make the effort. . . many teams had flags, customised t-shirts displayinghumorous and witty team logos and slogans, many reflecting pop culture, others hadbanners, hats, and many players were in fancy dress: nuns, bananas, school girls, Marioand Luigi, Uncle Sam. . . – Field Notes, WSOBP V, January 2, 2010.

Besides the vast array of costumes on show, carnivals require dancing, music, andstorytelling (Caillois, 1959/2001). The WSOBP encapsulates the laughter, reversal, andrevelry, associated with carnival. Echoing throughout the ballroom is loud music,participants (not competing momentarily) are wandering freely, dancing, drinking,storytelling, and cheering: combining to direct the liberatory ethos central tocarnivalistic life. Stories relayed follow a similar pattern: sexual debauchery,deviance, and novel excitements feature heavily. Dancing, drinking, wearingcolourful costumes, and sharing stories in the WSOBP space becomes a priority,serving to orchestrate the expectations of future debasing behaviour and theemotional bond among participants.

Emotional bond: carnival communion

[WSOBP] is the best place ever, it gives you a chance to get away and experience everybody,you get to see your friends from the West Coast, the Mid-West, I’ve got my friends here fromIreland, Germany, Canada. . . all over the World. . . – ‘Rob’, Male (27), The World Series of BeerPong VII Presents: ‘Bangerang’ (vimeo.com/36249246), February 14, 2012.

‘Rob’ highlights the emotional bond of ‘experiencing everybody’ as being central to theWSOBP experience. While BPONG remains the link between consumers, the emotionalexperiences, between ‘friends’, are largely outside the control of BPONG. Outside themarketer-controlled arena of the WSOBP ballroom, is the adult playground of ‘Vegas’(Belk, 2000), and particularly, the ‘Flamingo’ and ‘O’Shea’s’ (Casino). WSOBP participantsutilise a range of exciting experiences to establish carnival relationships:

O’Shea’s’ (next to the Flamingo) at the BPONG sponsored permanent beer pong area (6tables) is typically the meeting place outside of the WSOBP, for drinking, catching up, andfor ‘cash games’ (beer pong played for money). . . O’Shea’s is the first place I spoke to andplayed against many of the BPONG community members. . . if you are wearing a WSOBPwristband other participants interact. . . – Field Notes, WSOBP V, January 1, 2010.

I was at eight different room parties after we arrived in off the Strip. . . People were sharingalcohol, playing beer pong, listening to music, storytelling, and smoking. . . It is a very

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friendly atmosphere. I feel I could walk into any room party and be handed a beer or sit atany blackjack table of beer pong players and be welcomed. . . – Field notes, WSOBP VI,December 30, 2010.

At O’Shea’s and the hotel room parties occurring in the ‘Flamingo’, participants bondoutside the realms of the BPONG-controlled arena. The carnival atmosphere startsbubbling prior to the official WSOBP tournament. Participants establish carnivalrelationships by drinking, gambling, and playing beer pong. Official registration for theWSOBP occurs on 1 January; the donning of WSOBP wristbands unite participantsthroughout ‘Vegas’, spellbinding them in a temporary carnival community. Ancillarycarnival spaces unite participants in mutual anticipation of the WSOBP frenzy. Themutual willingness of participants to engage in the full range of experiences ‘Vegas’offers enhances the emotional bond and personal experiences:

. . .most importantly the fun level was through the roof. . . every person I talked to seemed tobe having a blast. . . If you never made the trip it’s worth every penny and I highlyrecommend it. Thanks again [BPONG] for another great job and an amazing few days. –‘Kyle’, posting in BPONG.COM Forum, January 11, 2011.

It was an awesome experience because we met new friends and we got to play againstpongers from different countries, we could yell as much/loud as we wanted. . . it wasdefinitely an experience! – ‘Tim’, posting in BPONG.COM Forum, January 12, 2011.

‘Kyle’ evangelises the ‘amazing few days’ of his WSOBP experience to non-participantson the basis that the WSOBP caters to a broad range of consumers; no matter whatone’s experiential desires, the WSOBP is a ‘blast’ and has the potential to provideextraordinary excitements. ‘Tim’s’ ‘awesome experience’ is influenced by the mutualwillingness of his ‘new friends’ to pursue debasing behaviours. The emotional bondamong participants intensifies to the collective ecstasy associated with ‘communion’(Gurvitch, 1941) as a result of the non-mimetic excitements established. Participantsescalate the marketer-facilitated eccentricities by engaging in non-mimetic, dangerous,consumption.

Carnival excess: non-mimetic consumption

Brandfests, and marketer-facilitated experiences, are typically associated with mild formsof hedonic consumption (Carù & Cova, 2007; Sherry et al., 2007). WSOBP participantsembrace the mild as foundational and augment the moderate excitements with non-mimetic dangerous consumption. BPONG provides a maximum of six optional beers overthe course of tournament play (10 am–5 pm), which is not a priority: ‘beer makes yousleepy, hard liquor is more energetic’ (‘Kent’, Field notes, WSOBP VII, January 3rd, 2012).Participants seek a peculiar performance-orientated form of intoxication: too sober andcompetitor ‘trash talk’ unsettles, too drunk and hand–eye coordination is diminished.Post-tournament alcohol consumption is far less strategic (5 pm–4 am). BPONG are notto blame for the wild intoxication levels, excessive consumption persists in the form ofvoluntary, extreme, and constant intoxication:

LOL. . . I think this is [constant alcohol consumption] one of the funny aspects of the WSOBP.Having to get ready early for ‘pong’ is hilarious. . . especially if you’re partaking in the

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evening events. . . drinking past 3–4 am the nights before. My first world series was rough. . .– ‘Dean’, posting in BPONG.COM Forum, November 20, 2009.

I never eat at the WSOBP. It’s too difficult. I am after drinking so much. . . I barely get an hoursleep and then I start drinking again. – ‘Sam’, Male (Aged 55), Informal conversation, WorldPong Tour, Atlantic City, June 28, 2011.

‘Dean’ highlights the constant alcohol consumption and the rough experience central tothe WSOBP. ‘Sam’ in a similar manner highlights the extent of the alcohol abuse; so‘difficult’ he cannot eat. Participants’ conversations during the WSOBP detail whatresemble timetables of alcohol consumption. As a result of the constant alcoholconsumption some participants become seriously ill. It is common to see participantseither passed out around the ‘Flamingo’, or vomiting, suffering physical injuries, ornursing severe hangovers. Alcohol consumption at the WSOBP becomes a form of‘edgework’ (Lyng, 1990): many participants staggering over. The extreme and constantalcohol consumption puts immediate and long-term health under serious strain:

Oh my head. . . My first thoughts when I woke: this was not going to be a good morning,how am I going to survive? I was vomiting bile for about an hour straight with a poundingheadache. I had my sunglasses on. I was not talking. I was sweating and empty retchingevery four steps – it was torture. – Field Notes, WSOBP VI, December 31, 2011.

At WSOBP V during Day 2 I was puking blood at one stage. . . – ‘Stew’, Informal conversation,WSOBP VII, January 3, 2012

I ended up in the ICU (intensive care unit) for 4 days after the ‘Series’ this last year. . . nojokes. – ‘Bert’, Facebook comment reflecting on WSOBP VII (2012), October 16, 2012.

The excessive alcohol consumption, outlined above, escalate the mimetic excitements ofthe WSOBP eccentricities to heights of non-mimetic, in which the excitement ofparticipation is out of control, caught up in frenzy, unreflective, and extremelydangerous (Elias & Dunning, 1986). Participants go to extreme lengths to maintain thefrenzy of non-mimetic excitements:

Participants are often so sick they begin mixing Emergen-C vitamin sachets into Smirnoff(vodka) or mix ‘Jack’ (bourbon) and Gatorade/Vitamin Water in order to ‘keep going’. – FieldNotes, WSOBP V, January 3, 2010.

WSOBP participants appropriate the meaning of marketplace resources to support andstimulate the carnival frenzy. Brands other than BPONG are incorporated as anexpression of carnival inversion. The Emergen-C, Gatorade, and Vitamin Water brandsare appropriated with carnival meaning: their intended use (health) is mocked. Theinversion of non-carnival brands produces carnivalistic ‘linking value’ (Cova, 1997),which ensures participants can maintain enough ‘good’ health to experience thefrenzy. Non-mimetic consumption contributes to illnesses beyond the WSOBPexperience also. Participants contract severe flus and colds post participation. As ameans to normalise the consequences of non-mimetic consumption, the post-WSOBPill health has been coined ‘Pong Flu’:

PONGDEMIC!!!! You guys should all be happy you’re sick. . . it’s part of the WSOBP experi-ence! – ‘Paul’, posting in BPONG.com Forum, January 12, 2012

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. . .nearly everybody pushes their bodies beyond normal limits by drinking, not sleeping, etc.When you do that, you’re going to break down your body. . .. – B____ (BPONG Owner),posting in BPONG.COM Forum, December 5, 2011.

It [WSOBP] was outstanding. . . apart from the heavy abuse to my body. . . drinking toomuch. I do have stomach problems so it’s not ideal for me to be drinking. . . I enjoy it somuch and get such a kick out of it. . . suffering the consequences of those vicious hangoversis worth it. . . – ‘Ken’, Male (28), Interview, August 31, 2011.

‘Paul’ discusses how being ill and sacrificing health is a part of the overall WSOBPexperience, pushing one’s body and mind beyond the normal realms of consumptionis expected. BPONG, to no effect, highlights to participants the dangers of their non-mimetic behaviour. ‘Ken’ highlights, underlying the ‘outstanding’ WSOBP experience is aself-destructive element, yet the ‘heavy abuse’ is overshadowed by the existential ‘kick’experienced. WSOBP participants accept that in order to experience this form ofexistential renaissance short-term and long-term health are sacrificed. Ill health during,and following, the WSOBP symbolises the destruction and renewal central to theideological premise of the archaic carnival (Caillois, 1959/2001). Besides theconsumption of alcohol, the frenzy, for a minority of participants, is occasionallysupported by illegal resources, in the form of marijuana and cocaine (consumed inhotel rooms), highlighting further the toxic, deviant, and non-mimetic consumptionexperiences desired, and satisfied by ‘Sin City’.

Establishing tonus: the delight in being deviant

The production of tensions is embedded in the WSOBP experience. Despite theemotional bond, within the WSOBP competitive arenas, performances get verballyheated and extremely aggressive. The WSOBP is an emotional polarity: participantsmove back and forth between the extremes of bonding and intense competition.Despite ‘trash and smack talk’, being personally cutting, witty, vulgar, offensive, and‘politically incorrect’, it is understood as a performance – not ‘real-life’: ‘What happens atthe table stays at the table’ (‘Daniel’, Field notes, WSOBP V, January 2, 2010). Participantsestablish tonus by engaging in passionate outbursts of strong emotion, however,physical fighting is considered one of the greatest profanities within the culture.Following performances, teams shake hands, often ‘hug it out’, and regularly go to thebar, or hotel rooms, to drink ‘strong vodka and cranberry’, or ‘strong Jack and Cokes’, ordo ‘shots’ with each other, and discuss the WSOBP experience. The aggressive emotionaloutbursts produce tensions and contribute to the overall level of tonus associated withthe WSOBP, while also providing platforms for enhanced carnival communion.

An additional means to establish tonus, via profanity, is choosing a WSOBP teamname, which often possess grotesque sexual meanings, or aggressive undertones:10 inches soft; Slut Nation; Dirty Vaginas; Projectile Vomit; Flick the Bean; C.U.N.T.;Balls & Shafts; The Touch of Death; Pick Your Poison; Smashing Time; Fatal Instincts;and THERE’S A PROBLEM WITH YOUR FACE! are just some examples of male, female,and mixed team names. However offensive behaviour, language, or team names,may appear, it’s a form of suspended reality, which reflects societal injustices andthe restricting nature of society (Turner, 1982). The world-upside-down ethos of the

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WSOBP is structured through laughter, for in tandem with profanity, and moralupheaval, carnivalesque joy emerges (Presdee & Carver, 2000).

Contrasting rules govern behaviour during the WSOBP carnival, a hidden aesthetic ofdisruption lurks – a certain appreciation of the ‘delight in being deviant’ prevails. Oneparticular method of upsetting cultural norms is that of publicising the private – the‘openness of the grotesque body’ (Wills, 1989):

We said: Man you were wasted (drunk) last night, do you not remember running nakedthrough the hotel? ‘Harry’ replied: What, man? I wasn’t naked. I was wearing a shoe. – FieldNotes, WSOBP V, January 3, 2010.

Publicising the private has the inherent ability to cause upset. Inappropriate, debasing,acts, such as ‘Harry’s’ streaking, draw those not participating into the carnival withouttheir consent – they become witnesses of disorder. While the openness of the body canupset public norms, due to widespread exposure, it’s no longer consideredextraordinary. WSOBP participants develop additional imperatives to maintainassociations with disorder and deviance:

‘Pat’ started continuously chanting/singing AIDS in tune to the song ‘Shots’ by LMFAO. Hejokingly began asking random women in the casino would it be okay if he kissed them thathe ONLY has AIDS. . . – Field Notes, WSOBP VI, January 3, 2011

In a packed elevator. . . shared with regular Flamingo customers. . . there was a brief momentof silence then ‘Phil’, while cheering and laughing, scattered his large bag of peanutsrepeatedly into the air, raining down on WSOBP participants and regular hotel customers. .. – Field Notes, WSOBP VII, January 3, 2012.

The inappropriate shocks, the outlined practices that are not regarded as amusing inday-to-day life become the foundation of carnival joy. Illnesses such as AIDS are mockedduring the carnival – a release from the tension of all illness in society. During theWSOBP frenzy, respectful behaviour and civilised conduct fail to exist in consciousthought: the fool is king!

Exit through the carnival: Lenten consumption and marketplace tensions

The excessive and non-mimetic behaviours of the WSOBP cannot last: the carnival mustend and Lent must come (Caillois, 1959/2001). The WSOBP carnival comes to an abruptend on the morning of 5 January:

Walking around the Flamingo lobby I didn’t know who was a beer pong player anymore. . .the vast majority have their WSOBP wristbands cut off, everyone is quiet, most have hang-overs, they look focused on the task of checking out and making their flights home. . . theylook like ‘normal’ people now. . . drinking Vitamin Water or Gatorade in order to speed up theprocess of being back in ‘normality’. . . Players are saying goodbyes but these are a lot lessanimated and more formal than on the drunken night previous. . . they look almost apolo-getic. – Field Notes, WSOBP VII, January 5, 2012.

After the WSOBP, I just hide out for a couple of weeks, build my money back up, forgetabout beer pong and stop drinking. . . make my way back into society (laughs). – ‘Colin’,Male (27), Informal conversation, WPT Atlantic City Championship, June 27, 2011.

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Once the WSOBP is over, participants express joy in abstinence, while extollinghappiness about reverting back to ‘society’, back to a sense of ‘normality’. Theimmediate revert to Lenten consumption highlights participants’ full commitment tothe WSOBP carnival: it has been played out in full non-mimetic frenzy and, as is tradition,followed by frugality and abstinence (Caillois, 1959/2001). Carnivalistic life is so powerfulthat post participation consumers can feel transformed – a ‘metamorphosis of being’(Belk, Wallendorf, & Sherry, 1989) – a ‘cyclical renaissance’ (Caillois, 1959/2001). The vastmajority of WSOBP participants make the ‘pilgrimage’ on multiple occasions, referring tothe ‘World Series’ as ‘amazing’, ‘outstanding’, ‘unreal’, ‘sacred’, ‘hallowed’, ‘magical’, andBPONG, the facilitators, the ‘Beer Pong Gods’: participants spellbound by the dark magicof the non-mimetic excitement.

Alluded to earlier, attempting to manage consumers wild with carnival abandon,sparks obvious risks. Adding fuel to fire, habituation breeds discontent: WSOBPparticipants seek escalated consumption experiences and tonus, which intensify thecyclical WSOBP frenzy. However, for BPONG, the carnival has escalated too far:

Our (BPONG) vision of beer pong revolves around sportsmanlike conduct. If this is not thetype of game you want to play, we don’t want you at our event. – S____ (BPONG), Facebookgroup discussion, January 8, 2012

‘I can do whatever the fuck I want’ is a perfect example of what’s wrong in the world of beerpong. – S_____(BPONG), Facebook comment reflecting on the WSOBP VII, January 9, 2012.

BPONG-facilitated eccentricities form the foundation for unique consumer experiences.However, participants’ desire for hedonic gratification and compulsion for non-mimeticexperiences has resulted in the experiential hijacking of the WSOBP, and BPONG brandideology. Participants’ understanding of the BPONG experience stands opposed tomanagements’ ‘vision’ for more controlled experiential outcomes – a brandfest thatcan be marketed to a wider audience. BPONG envision moderate and socially acceptablebehaviour at the WSOBP: ‘sportsmanlike conduct’ and participants not doing ‘whateverthe fuck they want’. Participants’ non-mimetic behaviours confine the commercialevolution of the BPONG brand, particularly with regard to securing TV coverage forthe WSOBP event, which operates at a financial loss (detailed in multiple informalconversations with BPONG brand owners between 2010 and 2012, also in Eells (2010)).BPONG attempted to manage participants’ carnival behaviours during WSOBP VII (2012),resulting in inconsistent behavioural warnings, major rule enforcement inconsistencies,foul language removed from team names, and players frequently being ‘ejected’ for‘inappropriate behaviour’. The imposed degeneracy resulted in participants beingdisappointed with the overall spectacle of WSOBP VII (many participants walking outin protest, vowing never to return). However, more severe for BPONG, brand owners’ areno longer viewed to possess communal authenticity:

. . . we are the people who made [BPONG] popular by our continued support. We supportedthem when they were nothing, and now that they have become big they try to screw overthe very same people that stuck by them and helped them get to where they are today. I’mnot saying that they ‘owe’ us anything besides common courtesy, honesty, and consis-tency. . . – ‘Frank’, posting in WSOBP VII Updates, Facebook group discussion, January 6,2012.

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‘Frank’ highlights the attempted diffusion of the ‘big’ brand, to have resulted in BPONG’sinconsistency in supporting carnival communion. Tensions have emerged on both sidesof the community–marketer relationship, as a result of participants’ continued pursuit ofconsumer excitement.

Discussion and conclusion

Having presented the findings of this study, what conclusions can now be drawn? Thisstudy found that non-mimetic consumer excitement emerges during a marketer-facilitated event in the form of a branded carnival. Consumers augment the marketer-facilitated excitements of the WSOBP, with excessive, out of control, and dangerousconsumption – behavioural codes associated with the carnival (Caillois, 1959/2001).While BPONG originally co-created carnivalesque eccentricities, the increasingescalation from mimetic to non-mimetic consumption is in opposition to themarketers’ vision. Consumers’ have hijacked the marketer-facilitated experientialplatforms, and brand ideology, transforming the intended brandfest into a brandedcarnival. However, the hijacking of brand ideology is largely unintentional, and directedby the pursuit of excitement. The non-mimetic communal frenzy, despite inspiring theformation of a global brand community (O’Sullivan, 2013), has confined the mainstreamevolution of the BPONG brand and promoted a number of tensions on both sides of thecommunity–marketer relationship. A branded carnival can be defined as:

A marketer-facilitated brand-centric celebration, in which consumers augment marketer-provided moderate, socially acceptable, excitements with non-mimetic dangerous con-sumption, resulting in the hijacking of brand ideology and the promotion of marketplacetensions.

Table 2 highlights the escalated characteristics of the branded carnival in comparison tothe brandfest phenomenon.

The WSOBP-branded carnival is not an isolated phenomenon. The branded carnivalconceptualisation can be applied to understand consumer behaviour during othermarketer-facilitated celebrations. For instance, in previously published workinvestigating the Beamish brand community (O’Sullivan et al., 2011), the mimeticexcitements of the marketer-controlled Beamish brewery tour were augmented withnon-mimetic consumption rituals in the form of excessive alcohol consumption, whichpromoted community-marketer tensions.

Arthur’s Day, the Guinness-fabricated brand-centric celebration, can be considered abranded carnival. Arthur’s Day was introduced in 2009 to celebrate the 250th

Table 2. Characteristics of brandfest and branded carnival.Brandfest Branded carnival

Marketer controlled Consumer hijackedMimetic excitement Non-mimetic excitementPersonal growth Existential renaissanceMarketer-assisted risk management Consumer edgework practicesCommunitas CommunionEnhances marketplace relationships Establishes marketplace tensionsShort-term and long-term brand consumption Abstinence, long-term brand consumption, evangelism

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anniversary of the iconic drink and to, ostensibly, support the arts and culturecommunities (Caroll, 2013). However, the Guinness-controlled mimetic excitements, inthe form of music entertainment, were augmented with non-mimetic consumption inthe form of dangerous alcohol consumption and debasing behaviours – someconsumers dancing naked and bloodied on broken glass in the streets of Temple Bar,Dublin (YouTube search ‘Arthur’s Day Temple Bar’ to view the full extent of the non-mimetic behaviour: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3t5sGAkZ0jk). Arthur’s Daybehaviours significantly increased strain on hospital emergency services, andeventually, due to government and medical criticism, public pressure, and othermarketplace tensions, Guinness cancelled Arthur’s Day (Caroll, 2013; Kelly, 2013;O’Brien, 2014). However strategic Guinness’ fabrication of Arthur’s Day, the majorcriticisms of Guinness’ marketing promotion resulted from the non-mimetic behaviourof consumers. Some consumers, destitute of quality and depth of marketplaceexperiences (Baudrillard, 1998), are unable to resist the dark magic of non-mimeticexcitement, and become drawn into the harmful side of consumption irrespective ofinstitutional visions. The hijackings enacted, during the branded carnivals outlined, arewithout brand-directed malice, communal brand celebration drives behaviour, however,the ‘over-celebration’, or frenzy, promotes considerable tensions: Consumers breathemagic into brands, but they can also suck the life from them (Cova et al., 2007).

The dark magic of consumer excitement provokes a number of additionalconsiderations for experiential marketers with regard to the community–marketerrelationship. This study restates Grayson’s (1999) warning of playfully wild excitements– marketers must take the carnival seriously. Marketers may originally seek to develop acarnivalesque brand image by co-creating eccentricities, however, the capacity of themarketer to subsequently impose control and re-establish sanitised consumption mayprove elusive. Any attempt to alter an established carnival ethos may stimulate tensionsin the community–brand relationship, which could result in the permanent dissipationof a loyal brand community (Cova & White, 2010). Much of the community-marketertensions observed in this study arose as a result of the marketers’ attempts to sanitiseand standardise a mainstream vision of ‘appropriate’ excitements: Tonus cannot bestandardised.

A heightened consideration of consumer experience highlights the subsequent needto engage in ongoing ethnomarketing (Cova & Cova, 2002) and employing anunambiguous consumer-orientated philosophy – tonus must be co-created withcommunities of consumers in an ongoing manner. By co-creating opportunities toproduce tensions and establish tonus, marketers increase the likelihood of authenticconsumer experiences and reduce the risks of an unexpected hijacking of brandideology, thus, reducing the potential of negative marketplace tensions and/orconflicts. The process of co-creating tonus becomes more difficult as marketers mustalso safeguard against habituation, which does not necessarily relate to the repetition ofritual but the depletion of tonus accompanying ritual repetition. Marketers must planand develop brand-centric communal celebrations as a series, not in isolation. Followingan initial brand-centric celebration, the tonus for subsequent events must escalate;however, the rate of escalation will be dependent on consumer disposition, whichmay subsequently be influenced by product category (O’Sullivan et al., 2011).Marketers face an arduous task, experiential marketing, becomes a form of commercial

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edgework: marketers must negotiate the edge of providing exciting brand-centricexperiences that establish adequate tonus, which satisfy consumers’ broaderexistential needs, while ensuring consumption rituals reflect mainstream brandideology favourably. If the level of tonus appears to be escalating out of control, thebrand-centric event could be rejuvenated (rebranded/renamed) in order to establishalternative forms of tonus, serving to reboot the consumption ethos and restoring brandideology in alignment with long-term marketing objectives (sanitised mainstream brandimage). Arthur’s Day, for instance, rebooted as Guinness Amplify, no longer targeting themainstream but the music communities.

With regarded to cultural significance, the branded carnival puts forth an argument ofopposition to marketplace ideology. Contemporary consumers experience a similardegree of constraint and oppression from sanctimonious marketplace ideology, itsnarratives, and brands that previous humans experienced from rulers, masters, and theChurch (Thompson, 2007). Carnivals differ from other social rituals, carnivals are moreflexibly responsive to social and even societal changes, as well as changes in politicaland economic structures (Turner, 1979). Rituals and performances of transgression havenot defused, societal and economic pressures have become associated with the dazzlingand disorientating marketplace (Gabriel & Lang, 1995; Žižek, 2011). The branded carnivalfurther supports the notion of consumers as ‘paradox incarnate’ (Cova et al., 2007):participants temporarily elude and evade the marketplace ideology of restraint andmoderation via the use and ‘misuse’ of marketplace resources. The branded carnival isan emancipatory practice through which a temporary community of consumers can defyideological imperatives of the marketplace and establish their own temporary utopianexperiential realm.

Dholakia and Firat (1998) suggest that all attempts at circumventing, rejecting, orrebelling against the market have been co-opted by the market as just anothermarketable commodity. However, the branded carnival stimulates tensions beyondmarketers’ co-option desires. Marketers want consumers to desire frenzy, but not forthem to live it too intensely (Reith, 2005), and certainly not too often, if frenzy threatensmarketing objectives. The branded carnival is as a moribund echo of the ancientcarnivals of the Saturnalian type, however, motivation for participation persists: theresulting pleasure is both uplifting and temporary, a glancing culture ‘high’ inopposition to the restrictive and illusionary nature of capitalist society, whichultimately returns participants to the doors of desire, eager for more consumption(Presdee, 2000). Acts of contemporary carnival then become a cyclical vehicle forexistential renaissance, a means to establish ephemeral authenticity and freedom ofexistence in contrast to the imposed structures of capitalist society. Through acts ofcollective market ideology ‘mockery’ and festivity, the carnival community exhausts theneed for genuine revolution (2000). Consumers appear not to be attempting to escapethe market but instead play with it (Kozinets, 2002): playful renewal precedes genuinerevolt.

Gabriel and Lang (1995) argue that if consumers fail to fulfil hedonic desires thenon-mimetic excitements of destruction become entwined in consumption – analternative delight to savour (Presdee, 2000). However, the pursuit of consumerexperience, in the form of novel excitements, has become an unending process ofseduction, frustration, and humiliation (Gabriel & Lang, 1995). Consumers cannot

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fulfil the erotic simmer of expectations perpetuated by the market: a demoralisingcycle of dependency, disillusioned frustration, and hate spirals (Campbell, 1987;Treadwell et al., 2012). However, once moral restraints have been removed fromconsumption, the pursuit of pleasure can quickly turn to violence and aggression(Žižek, 2011; Žižek & Fiennes, 2013). While some consumers display contempttowards market forces, it is conceivable that consumers’ violence, destruction,and desire to renew, as a result of their disillusioned market-induced frustrationcan become self-directed. This study highlights, in the form of the ‘heavy abuse’ ofalcohol, the extent to which some consumers’ dissatisfaction within the confines ofthe market can become be self-directed. Consumers’ frustration with unattainablemarket demands results in consumers ‘destroying’ and ‘renewing’ themselvesbefore the pressures of the capitalist cycle has an opportunity to so (Žižek &Fiennes, 2013). Thus, within capitalist society, a hidden aesthetic of destructionnot only exists on fantasy level, it also serves to direct and orchestrate consumerbehaviour.

Cultural paroxysms of market-directed disruption erupt with greater magnitude thanthat of the relatively contained branded carnival. Take for example, the London/Englishriots of August 2011, and the non-mimetic market-directed destruction central to theparoxysm, transgressions which cost British taxpayers £200 million. Removing thehistorical and political complexities embedded (Briggs, 2012; Sutterlüty, 2014), thefrenzy of destruction became directed towards the capitalist system, with over 2500commercial outlets being ransacked (Treadwell et al., 2012). Highlighting the magnitudeof the market-directed non-mimetic behaviour, Treadwell et al. (2012) refer to theLondon/English riots as ‘shopocalypse now’. Widespread cultural dissatisfactionresulting from market pressures contributed greatly to the non-mimetic escalation ofthe London/English riots (Moxon, 2011; Treadwell et al., 2012; Žižek, 2011). Beamishtours, the WSOBP, Arthur’s Day, ‘Black Friday’ looting, and the London/English riots,despite their cultural potency and magnitudes resonating at escalating intensities, eachnon-mimetic paroxysm possesses the common thread of disrupting marketplaceideology and are direct ramifications of the human dissatisfaction with capitalistideology.

Limitations and future research

This study could have benefited from additional phenomenological accounts ofconsumer experience in the form of consumer diaries (Patterson, 2005). Despite anumber of participants agreeing to complete experiential diaries, the reflection andrationalisation central to being a research participant was, understandably, not apriority for them during the WSOBP. Out of the 20 participants that agreed tocomplete diaries, not a single account was returned, each offering similar apologies– further reinforcing their carnival experience. The branded carnivalconceptualisation requires additional research to explore its limits and boundariesbeyond alcohol-related consumption. However, the carnival and alcohol consumptionare inexplicitly mixed (Caillois, 1959/2001). The data for this study were primarilycollected between 2010 and 2012: a similar investigation conducted in the presenttime could yield alternative outcomes and generate additional perspectives on

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consumer excitement. For instance, an alternative investigation of non-mimeticconsumer excitement could examine illicit consumer behaviour particularly withregard to illicit recreational drug consumption. Ongoing research investigatesrecreational ecstasy consumption to contribute to the understanding of the humandesire for limit experiences and existential transcendence (Jay, 1995; Lyng, 2012),achieved through the pursuit of ‘toxic play’ activities, in the form of consumerbehaviour (O’Sullivan, 2015).

Multiple magic modalities exist within the market, some are light-hearted, fancy-free, and mirthful, others, however, are dark, destructive, and harmful – magic in themarket is a neutral phenomenon, serving only to enhance the natural desires ofthose spellbound. However, dark magic requires additional research attention:marketing and consumer research appear diffident of investigating socialundesirable modalities, despite the potential learning from an existential andsocietal point of view (Fitchett & Smith, 2002; Goulding et al., 2002). RestatingThompson’s (2007) call, and building upon the work of Goulding et al. (2009),Murphy and Patterson (2011), Hackley et al. (2013), Cocker et al. (2012), Croninet al. (2014), and Van Hout and Hearne (2014), among others, this study highlightsthe extent to which consumer researchers must ‘muckrake’ and conduct research onwhat consumers are doing, not what consumers should be doing, in order to providecritical insights as to how the ‘dirty work of capitalism’, and the dissatisfying realityof marketplace ideology, impacts upon the quality of human experience.

Notes

1. Meaning the dissolution of normative social structure role-sets, statuses, and duties: setapart in time, space, and behaviour from the routinised nature of everyday structured life(Turner, 1979, 1982)

2. Tension-inspired vitality aroused during leisure activities (Elias & Dunning, 1986)3. Within the cultural studies, anthropology, and sociology literatures the terms ‘festival’ and

‘carnival’ are used to characterise transgressive behaviours of a similar ilk. However, in orderto distinguish from the ‘brandfest’ phenomenon, ‘carnival’ will be primarily usedthroughout.

4. Pseudonyms are used throughout.5. The male-dominated nature of the BPONG community raises a number of gender identity

issues, which are, beyond the scope and objectives of this paper, for a detailed discussionon gender negotiation, performance, and alignment, with regard to the WSOBP, seeO’Sullivan and Richardson (2013).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Stephen R. O’Sullivan is lecturer in marketing and consumer culture at Cork University Business School,University College Cork, Cork, Ireland. His research is primarily situated in the consumer culture theorydimensions of marketplace cultures and consumer identity projects. Current research involves aninvestigation of contemporary play, particularly that which is harmful in nature. Additional areas of

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research interest include: fandom, consumer movements, brand strategy, market mavenism, edgework,and ethnographic representation.

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