If you’ve been watching the World Series (Go Red Sox!) you cannot have missed the annual Taco Bell “Steal a Base, Steal a Taco” promotion. If any player on either team steals a base during the World Series, people can go into a Taco Bell for a free Taco on November 1. Although base stealing is far less popular than 20 or 30 years ago, fans didn’t have to wait long as Boston Red Sox player Mookie Betts stole a base in the first inning of the first game. Tacos on!
The promotion includes frequent mentions during all of the Series games, ads, social media posts to Taco Bell’s 1.9 million Twitter followers and followers on other social networks, and so on. Beyond the tacos, the promotional elements for sale include Steal a Taco baseball caps, and Topps baseball cards of all past players who stole the World Series base that triggered the free taco.
The results from the promotion last year were down from the highly rated 2016 seven-game World Series, when the Chicago Cubs ended a 108-year drought of World Series championships against the Cleveland Indians, who have not won since 1948. While more people definitely were coming into the Taco Bell stores during the promotion, in 2017 it was 17% less of a bump than 2016.
Results may be even worse this year because TV ratings for the five-game World Series were down 23% from last year. Ho hum, another Boston team winning a championship. Haven’t we seen this show before?
Taco Bell also runs a similar “Steal a Game, Steal a Taco” promotion during the NBA championship series in which the free tacos are triggered if either team wins a game on its opponent’s home court.
