An Ice Cream Truck Owner Is So Sick of Influencers, He Charges Them Double
The angry ice cream man instituted the policy after getting a request to serve a 300-person event in exchange for “exposure.”
If you find self-proclaimed Instagram “influencers” to be annoying, an ice cream vendor named Joe Nicchi could be the hero you’ve been waiting for.
Nicchi runs the acclaimed CVT Soft Serve truck in Los Angeles, and he’s going viral for ‘gramming a pic of himself holding a sign that reads, “Influencers pay double.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/ByJDx0iJLqE
After fielding countless requests for free cones in exchange for online “exposure,” our dude here decided to take a stand against it all with a very poignant post of his own.
“We’ve decided to make this thing official with signage. We truly don’t care if you’re an Influencer, or how many followers you have,” he wrote.
“We will never give you a free ice cream in exchange for a post on your social media page. It’s literally a $4 item…well now it’s $8 for you. #InfluencersAreGross.”
Nicchi described the impetus for his anti-influencer campaign in a recent interview with Vice.
“Last Thursday, I got an event request to do a party on a weekend for 300 people in exchange for the word they love to use, which is ‘exposure,'” Nicchi said. “I can’t do that; I can’t work for free.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/BzV-nCBJyXG
And he shouldn’t. As Time notes, CVT Soft Serve was named “Best Food Truck” by L.A. Weekly in its inaugural year, topped Los Angeles magazine’s best food truck listings in 2017, and has been included in Goop’s “Definitive LA Food Truck Guide.”
Needless to say, business is booming without any help from social media-addicted millennials.
“We work a lot of these [food truck] events on the weekends, and I’m not going to sound like a douchebag, but we have really long lines,” he continued.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BzdMazAJ-lg
“It’s evident that we’re a popular business, but I’ve had many young Millennials who say things like ‘I’m surprised that you only have 5,000 followers.’ What does it matter? I have a line down the street.”
“If Instagram went away tomorrow, I would still exist. It doesn’t make sense to me that people are so concerned by that number.”
Fuck it, man. Charge them triple.
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