Mountain Dew hired Quaker City Mercantile to show them how to better reach trend influencers who have become increasingly immune to their over-produced, multi-million dollar TV commercials.

Our first project together—and there were many more to come—was a bizarre, under-the-radar clothing line called MD-Gear.com. MD-Gear interpreted the Mountain Dew brand essence and vintage Mountain Dew ads in a brand new light that connected with the tastemakers who were rejecting all things "mainstream." We promoted the clothing line with some Internet banner ads and some super low-budget spots—when we say low budget, we're talking bargain basement budget. However, the spots were a huge hit with both consumers and the marketing people at Mountain Dew that had been spending ridiculous amounts of cash on TV advertising.

Ultimately, Quaker City Mercantile was very successful in selling the MD-Gear line into retailers across the country. We had actually been able to convince the tastemakers who were scorning everything to pay money to wear Mountain Dew's logo. Really, it was pretty amazing.