Ofo bikes in Shanghai are going bananas this week. In line with the release of its third instalment of the Despicable Me franchise today, you may find some of the yellow share bikes around the city have been given a bit of a Minion makeover.
If you gloss over the fact that the whole thing is an odd (if not clever) collaboration between a rental bike company and a major film production studio (Illumination Entertainment), the concept was very carefully thought through. A week before the launch, Ofo's team published a series of GIFs (below) with the slogan 'Look who's yellow with us' ('看看谁和我们黄在一起', kan kan shui he wo men huang zai yi qi). Despite sounding like a very casual approach to discussing liver failure, the slogan was used to create hype for the impending arrival of the Minion bikes and the movie.
Celebrating the launching of yellow Minion bikes with Ofo'. Credit: Alawei Shanghai
All this effort just to promote a sequel? Well, we do know for a fact that Despicable Me is currently the highest grossing animated franchise in the world, and that is hardly a surprise considering its PG appeal and a returning band of A-list actors such as Steve Carell and Kristen Wiig.
If you're going to see the film this weekend, there's no better way to arrive at the cinema, really. The film is on general release at cinemas around Shanghai from today.
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