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Roto-Rooter Video Hugs The World

Last Updated on October 25, 2021

April 25 is National Hug A Plumber Day. Seriously. It’s a thing. And obviously, it being a real and fairly self-explanatory holiday, it is the most exciting and emotionally cathartic day for plumbers, those lonesome heroes who perform the oft unthanked task of removing the smelly waters from our homes. On April 25, the natural affirmative expression of hugging is loosed from its societal tether, and we are encouraged to express our thankfulness in a warm and very normal embrace. Who knew plumbers wouldn’t feel weirded out about getting a bazillion hugs from near strangers? And who knew that near strangers wouldn’t feel weirded out about ending a business transaction with a hug?

Hug A Plumber Day is a holiday that celebrates PVC and its purveyors, and our friends at Roto-Rooter couldn’t let this auspicious day slip by without a proper jubilee. So they hired US Digital Partners to promote National Hug A Plumber Day for those non-plumbers who may have never heard of the day, and for those plumbers who may have been reticent about explaining it to them.

We filmed two videos with our team of improv actors and professional huggers (one to be released next year, so mark your calendars) and cut together a day-in-the-life perspective on a plumber’s typical April 25th, hug after hug after hug. Roto-Rooter released the video a week in advance, and the response we received from social media was impressive. In a few short days, the relatively unknown holiday of Hug A Plumber Day was introduced to nearly 1.5 million Facebook users who viewed, shared, liked and commented our video with an unprecedented dynamism. YouTube proved equally viral, and anecdotally we heard from one plumber (and ghost hunter) who noticed a measurable increase in his daily hug count and personal self esteem.

This is another great example of a business leveraging content to smartly engage with their audience. No one will watch a video and immediately call a plumber (because you only need a plumber when you really need a plumber), but hundreds of thousands of people interacted with the Roto-Rooter brand on a day that may have slipped by as just another Saturday.

And here’s the video!