A Paris store selling athleticwear let customers steal its merchandise under one condition: that they outrun a professional sprinter as they attempted to make off with the goods.
For one day last month, Paris’ Distance boutique — which has locations across Europe and in Africa — tagged its apparel “ROB IT TO GET IT” and tapped French Olympian Méba Mickael Zeze, who once ran the 100-meter dash in under 10 seconds, as a security guard.
Distance shared the results of the PR stunt in a YouTube video that was earlier reported on by The Washington Post, where 74 patrons ran out of the shop with a pair of sneakers in hand, but were caught by Zeze.
Only two customers got off with free items — one man and one woman who ran across an intersection just as the light at the crosswalk turned red.
Lionel Jagorel, a Distance manager who opened the Paris store in 2019, said it was worth losing a few items in favor of the publicity.
“We lost two items, but I think the value of the campaign is really big,” Jagorel told The Washington Post.
“We were assuming that the concept and the videos would have a lot of buzz,” he added — and he was correct, as the campaign video generated nearly 24,000 views since it was posted nearly two weeks ago.
French advertising agency BETC was behind the campaign, which was created with the intention of going viral, per The Washington Post.
Distance’s “ROB IT TO GET IT” stunt comes at a time when shoplifting is plaguing retailers, especially in US metros like New York and San Diego.
Thus, Distance didn’t promote the one-day event, and only posted a sign outside its Paris location on Sept. 13, according to The Washington Post.
When the store opened at 11 a.m., merchandise boasted “ROB IT TO GET IT” tags and store employees were on hand to explain to customers that they were free to grab the items if they could outrun the security guard.
Zeze, who strolled around the store throughout the day, wore a black polo shirt with a band on his left arm that said “security.”
Many customers didn’t recognize the 29-year-old athlete, and took their chance on trying to outrun him.
Zeze barely broke a sweat catching most so-called “thieves” throughout the day, sprinting a mere 35% of his maximum speed, per The Washington Post.
As the day went on, some customers tried to trick the pro sprinter. One shopper struck up a conversation with Zeze while a friend swiped a pair of sneakers and ran off.
Despite the delay, Zeze caught up anyway, The Post reported.
It wasn’t until around 4 p.m. that a customer was able to nab a free item. As Zeze was chasing down one avid runner trying to swipe a pair of grey trainers that a 33-year-old avid Distance customer was able to take a pink T-shirt.
Representatives for Distance at BETC did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
The “ROB IT TO GET IT” campaign wasn’t the first time Distance worked with BETC for a clever campaign.
In September 2021, both companies teamed up to release a video of runners attempting to activate Paris’ speed cameras, which were installed in the city to prevent drivers from exceeding the posted speed limit of 30 kilometers per hour, or about 19 mph, according to The Washington Post.
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