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An Insider View of Cards Against Humanity’s Infamous PR Strategy

The PR Summit is just around the corner, and PRSA Pittsburgh is proud to bring Cards Against Humanity’s Jenn Bane to our first annual event. As we discussed in our blog post last week, the summit is designed to challenge how you think about the risk of disruption and how to build authentic relationships with your audience.

In advance of the summit, we asked Jenn for a short preview of her insider’s look behind the bestselling game:

You’ve helped Cards Against Humanity pull off some incredible stunts. Were there any that you thought were going to be impossible to achieve?

A few years ago, we went to Australia for a gaming conference. It was our first time in Australia and we made a huge booth on the show floor that was completely USA-themed. We had an Uncle Sam on stilts, flags waving, huge posters of former Presidents and American junk food. I wore a fake raccoon hat the whole time. We even had a loud marching band come through and cause a scene (that was hard to find because there aren’t really marching bands in Australia, it’s not a thing there). The execution was incredible — our events team did an absolutely amazing job making this booth — but I wasn’t sure if people at this conference would find the booth funny.

I was completely wrong. The booth was adored and we sold out of games in six minutes. I’ve never seen anything like it.

Despite Cards Against Humanity’s incredible financial success, you’ve always offered the game for free, allowing people to download and print their own versions. Why?

We’ve always offered Cards Against Humanity as a PDF you can download and print. If people play it with their friends once, they might want their own version. In the beginning when we were unknown it was important to simply get the game in front of people, and the PDF was an easy way to do that. We’ll always offer the main game for free.

You’ve been the brains behind Cards Against Humanity’s notoriously hilarious customer service strategy. What’s your most memorable customer interaction?

I have a soft spot for the emails we received during Black Friday 2015. We sold nothing — literally nothing. You could give us money, but we made it clear you would receive nothing in return. We got hundreds of emails from “customers” (some angry, most of them delighted) demanding to know when they would receive nothing in the mail.

Don’t miss Jenn at the Summit! Register now!