Sunday, February 28, 2010
Efforts by the U.S. Census Bureau to encourage Americans to participate in this year’s national headcount include paying a fortune cookie company to print promotional messages on those tiny slips of wonder that come with plates of fried rice. For $3,000, the Tsue Chong Company, based in Seattle, plans to produce two million fortune cookies by April that include the pitch: “Put down your chopsticks and get involved in Census 2010.”
Company owner Timothy Louie said someone from the Census Bureau contacted him about whether printing special messages was possible. Once Louie said yes, a deal was struck between the federal agency and the business that sells fortune cookies to restaurants in Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington State.
Other promotional strategies employed by Census officials include running a $2.5 million Super Bowl commercial using Hollywood actors to deliver a census message, and getting Commerce Secretary Gary Locke to pitch the headcount while serving as grand marshal of San Francisco’s Chinese New Year Parade.
As for Tsue Chong, they have proved flexible in the past, producing fortune cookies with Bible versions inside and even folded tacos with messages in Spanish.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Eye Opener: Fortune Cookies Promoting the Census (by Ed O’Keefe, Washington Post)
Seattle Companies Churn Out Fame and Fortunes, in Cookies (by Brad Wong, Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
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