Weird Collaborations That Get New Customers

Intro

You’re listening to Underestimated, the podcast that helps small business owners turn their size into their unfair advantage, so they can grow without burning out. Here’s your host, Shawna Suckow.

Introduction: Beyond the Charity Collab

Have you ever done a collaboration with another small business to drive business to both of you? Well today, I’m going to be taking that a giant huge step forward and talking about weird unusual collaborations because they really stand out and they get media coverage and they get people to go “what?” They get people to stop the scroll. And it’s so much more than just “we’re partnering with a charity to do this thing,” which is great. But everybody’s doing that now and so we have to step it up a notch and come up with things that accomplish those same goals, whether it’s got a charitable angle or not, and we’ll talk about some of those today. But let’s unpack types of collaborations that you can consider and you can try any of these or come up with your own. Hopefully this will get you thinking creatively about what you can do.

The Taxidermy and Cheese Billboard

This first one has been on my mind for 20 years. Because when my husband — at the time now my husband — was driving to Wisconsin for work from Minnesota, he would always pass this billboard that said “taxidermy and cheese” and he would call me and say “hey, do you need any taxidermy or cheese?” and we’d have a good laugh and it was just this thing we did.

Well, I dug a little deeper into why does this collaboration exist. And I found this out. According to its website — which is now they just rebranded in 2024 — Dave Brummel and his wife Sandy started this company together, combining his talent of taxidermy with her father’s ten-time world champion cheesemaking skills. And they made this a successful run for years and years. But her father passed away, she did not continue the cheesemaking. I don’t know why they kept the sign up, probably because it’s just so well known and it gets attention. Now they sell taxidermy and clay.

Duck Donuts + Craft Brewery: Beer & Donut Tasting Flights

The next weird collaboration was born in my own classroom, which was so exciting to see happen. So I had this group of small business owners, I was doing a session on marketing, and I split them up. I had everybody stand and I said “quietly go stand next to the person who you think is most different from you.” And this one pair of men stood out to me. The one man was wearing a three-piece suit, very button-down, looked like he was in maybe his 50s or 60s. The other man looked to be in his 30s, tall, big guy, wearing a sleeveless shirt with full sleeve tattoos and a scruffy beard. They did on the surface look very opposite. But they were both really creative businessmen.

So it turns out that the guy in the three-piece suit owned a franchise of Duck Donuts. And the other guy with the tattoos owned a brewery in town — a smaller town in Pennsylvania. And what they came up with during that session was beer and donut tasting flights. Oh my gosh. I would seriously drive to go experience this.

So the way that this worked is at the end of most days, Duck Donuts has leftover donuts, and rather than throw those away, they decided to bring them to the brewery and the brewery would use them as inspiration to make beer flavors. Then on the brewery’s slowest night — I think a Tuesday — they would serve donuts from Duck Donuts along with beers that were paired to go with those flavors. And it went mad. It went crazy. And this became so popular. What a fabulous collaboration that never would have happened because these guys probably would never have talked to each other on the surface.

RAGBRAI, Yappy Hours & the Beer-Dog Connection

RAGBRAI is an annual bike ride across the state of Iowa. And RAGBRAI has this tradition that at every stop there is something like pie or beer. These are the only things I think could motivate me to ride a bike five miles let alone across the state of Iowa. It has attracted an unlikely crowd of people who maybe never would have done this but now do this because it’s so fun. It brings business to the local communities they stop in. Great PR. New people every year. How fabulous is that?

And speaking of beer and dogs — a lot of breweries have done the “yappy hour,” where breweries or bars open their establishment to dogs, and rescue dogs are brought in for adoption. We are foster dog parents and we have gone to these as well. This is such a win-win. In Minnesota we love our patios in the summer — if we can bring our dogs, even better. If we can help dogs that need re-homes, so much better. If we can do that while having a beer, win win win win all the way around.

Pop-Up Collabs: The Rural Telecom Story

A client of mine, a rural telecom — now they do mobile and Wi-Fi — decided they wanted to do pop-up events rather than one expensive annual event. So at Christmastime they decided to do a pop-in at a pizza place that had just gotten great press. This pizza place was having dog pictures with Santa to bring in traffic. My client decided: anyone who brings their dog in for this, we’re going to pay their fee to have this done because it all goes to charity, and if they want to donate, we’ll match it.

It cost them only a few hundred dollars. Think of the word of mouth. Think of the media coverage. Think of the goodwill they built. You don’t think of heartwarming when you think “my Wi-Fi company is so heartwarming.” Well, they’re changing that, one pop-up collab at a time.

Dog of the Week, Calendars & Community

If you have a business that does anything outdoors — a house painter, a landscaper — why not do a “Dog of the Week” with permission of the owners? And at the end of the year you make a calendar. Who’s going to buy this? Anybody who loves dogs. Anybody who owns one of those dogs. You sell this, people buy this, or you give it away, all of the above. Proceeds go to fund your small business in the off-season or to a local charity or both.

And pick a local charity if you’re a local business. This matters because community is something that huge corporations cannot duplicate. My Wi-Fi client is getting encroached on by Google Fiber and Xfinity. But this company has been around for decades. Doing things that support the local community — that matters to people. It gives you a talking point all year long. Win-win-win.

Coloring Contests, Crafting Stations & Waiting Rooms

If you are a credit union, a car dealership, or any local brick-and-mortar business — why not have a coloring contest? People make your business a destination. If people are getting a mortgage or waiting for their car to be serviced and they have their kids with them, it can be really distracting for everyone. So give their kids something to do. Gather up the entries, pick a winner each month in different age groups, and at the end of the year do the calendar thing. Who’s going to buy this? Every parent. Every grandparent.

You have to get permission — always, especially with people’s kids. Get waivers or use the kid’s first name, last initial, and age. Waivers are always safe and you can drum one up quite easily using AI.

How about a crafting station? This draws moms and kids and is great for any waiting room. Dentists, doctors’ offices, car repairs, oil changes, car washes. A guided craft can even be a destination — “This Monday night between 6 and 9 PM if you come to the car wash, we’re going to have someone lead your kids in making a Christmas ornament.” Think about crafting.

The Mechanic with Legos & Sensory-Safe Spaces

I spoke to my largest audience ever — 4,000 car care mechanic shop owners. I asked what makes your shop different, what do you have in your lobby that’s maybe different. One man raised his hand and said, “I have Legos. I have lots and lots of Legos, because my son is autistic and he loves Legos and he can get lost in them for hours and it just makes him really happy.”

And I said: promote this please. You are helping other parents by giving them a place where they can go for service and they know it’s going to be a great environment for their kid. You can do this as a collaboration with your local library or a local toy store — a sensory-safe playtime on the first Tuesday of every month. This has a huge crowd of support. This will get lots of PR. And it will drive really, really appreciative parents to your establishment. Even if they can’t come, they’re going to remember you.

The Weirdest One: Death Cafes

I saved the weirdest one for last. There is this online — it’s now a business — called Death Cafe dot com. This is a global movement started in the UK by John Underwood in 2011 where people gather at cafes, coffee shops, and community spaces or businesses to drink tea, eat cake, and talk about death. No agenda, just conversation. As of now, there have been 23,344 Death Cafes held in 97 countries.

So if your business lends itself to something weird, or something to do with death or comforting or grief or anything like that, this is so weird and wonderful. And it gives people a place to form community in the weirdest most wonderful way. I love it. I’m here for it.

Wrap-Up: What Doesn’t Exist Where You Are Yet?

I hope these have planted some seeds as to what kind of weird, unusual, wonderful collaborations you can do. If you’re local, especially in your local community. Or if you are regional or national and you’re still a small biz, what can you do? I know I left out online small businesses with this one — all my examples were brick-and-mortar. But there are ways to adapt. People can send in their coloring contest things from their kids. They can send in pictures of their dogs. You can have a Death Cafe — it can just be virtual.

My point is: think about what you can do that doesn’t already exist. Or do research and maybe it’s something that doesn’t exist where you are, but it’s been done successfully somewhere else. Call up that business. Ask what they did, what they would do differently.

I hope this has been helpful. I know this has been a weird episode. I love this. I’m going to be doing more weird episodes like this. Thanks for tuning in.

Outro

Thanks for listening to Underestimated, hosted by Shawna Suckow. To connect with Shawna, go to thebuyerinsider.com.