Here’s What Happened Inside Tide’s Super Bowl #LaundryLater War Room

This particular Sunday is special, but not because tonight’s matchup in Miami determines the NFL’s best football team. Nor is it special because everyday Americans put their differences aside and come together (for a few hours, at least).

No, this Sunday is special because so many people look at the exact same thing at the exact same time—a feat that’s becoming increasingly rare in an era of Disney+, Fortnite, Pinterest and Pornhub. Today, several brands are paying a record $5.6 million for 30 seconds that they hope about 100 million people will watch all at the same time, and millions more later. Pressure to make that moment count is high.

I’m currently standing in a 16th floor conference room in an office building not far from Times Square in Midtown Manhattan. Tonight, it’s a war room made up of 40 people, all supporting one brand with multiple spots in today’s Super Bowl: Tide. Most of the people in the room are from Procter & Gamble’s Woven agency, a hybrid of PR and creative teams. The goal of the night: to amplify Tide’s message across social media, get attention and make sure that attention is positive.

The 1,000-square-foot room includes a long white table running down the middle, with three big TV screens at one end. The left monitor displays data from a company called NetBase—impressions, net sentiment, emerging topics, stuff like that. The right monitor shows Tweetdeck, with 10 columns tracking various Tide-related terms and phrases. The middle screen, naturally, shows the game.

Snacks and drinks are everywhere—popcorn, mixed nuts, Doritos, tiny Twix and Snickers bars, Coke, Sprite, Corona Extra. In the kitchen, just adjacent to the war room, is a make-your-own Chipotle burrito buffet. There’s also a green cake meant to look like a football field with a Tide logo on the 50-yard line.

One woman is wearing a red Tide shirt and another, a blue Tide shirt. Absolutely no one is wearing anything that identifies them as a fan of either the Kansas City Chiefs or the San Francisco 49ers.

The core members of Team Tide are Henry Molski, communications manager at Procter & Gamble; Matthew Wormington, brand communications manager at Procter & Gamble; and Jenny Maxwell, brand manager at Tide. The three of them sit directly across from me.

When I show up around 5:30 p.m., they’re doing final checks. They’ve spent months preparing and have an arsenal of GIFs and copy in preparation for almost any scenario. Like the game itself, the outcome of how the public perceives and reacts to their campaign isn’t predetermined. Molski, Wormington and Maxwell are here to make sure Tide wins.

But, what could go wrong? Tide is the leading laundry detergent brand in the nation, according to market research firm Euromonitor. The campaign is shot, edited and ready. And it’s not like Shakira is going to eat a Tide Pod during the halftime show. If anything, Maxwell tells me, her biggest concern is living up to the standards set by Tide’s latest campaigns, “Laundry Night” and “It’s a Tide Ad.”

Then again, probably the worst response imaginable is apathetic silence. Team Tide doesn’t want that.

First half

Kickoff.

“You guys ready?” asks Maxwell with enthusiasm. “Here we go!”

For what feels like the first time since I arrived, the room approaches something close to quiet. Everyone is staring at a screen, whether it’s a laptop, smartphone or one of the three TVs. I can distinctly hear someone crack open a can of something in the kitchen behind us. Someone’s toddler is ambling around the room.

A guy sitting next to me, who works on the PR side, gets a text. It’s from Emily Hampshire, the actress starring in Tide’s spots alongside It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s Charlie Day. He shows me the message. “OMG I’m so nervous,” it reads.

Soon after, it happens. Tide’s first spot of the night, a 45-second one, airs.

The team claps when the ad ends. Then everyone gets to work, as the Tweetdeck screen starts shuffling.

The idea, it seems, is to get people and brands alike to respond with their own spin on the idea “Something Now, #LaundryLater.”

Taped to one of the walls are five sheets of paper outlining which brands are supposed to tweet at Tide and when, along with which social platform and the approved copy. This includes Doritos, Mr. Clean, Bud Light, Burger King, Monster Energy, Pepto-Bismol, Toyota and so on. Plenty of brands seem to want in on Tide’s Big Game action.

People yell confirmations at a guy holding a marker next to the list when a certain tweet goes up. Once a brand is named, he crosses it off. I ask why he doesn’t just have the list in a digital format. He tells me it’s “more satisfying” to cross it off in analog.

At times, there seems to be confusion over which brands are tweeting Tide’s campaign organically and which are simply carrying out preplanned strategy.

Kettle Foods, for instance, joins in on the fun by tweeting Tide’s #LaundryLater hashtag. “That’s the dream,” says the guy holding the marker, thinking it happened spontaneously.

But then: “Oh no, wait. We have them,” he says, as he locates the brand on his list. The same thing happens with Home Depot seconds later.

Something is wrong. Maxwell gets a call from her boss.

Turns out when the team tweeted out their first commercial, they linked to @EmilyHampshire, a person following no one and followed by about a dozen people, instead of @EmilyHampshire_, the Schitt’s Creek star and Tide’s Super Bowl star.

Team Tide doesn’t like this, but it’s too late now. Can’t delete it and lose all the building momentum, they agree. That tweet, with the wrong Emily, remains Tide’s pinned tweet throughout the night.

“So, we probably just made her more famous than she needed to be,” Maxwell says.

A creative next to me suggests that the best way to respond to the situation is with self-deprecation. His suggestion: “Typos now, #LaundryLater.”

Maxwell agrees. “Just own it,” she says.

Halftime

For the first time tonight, people start to relax. Some stand up and go into the kitchen.

“I can’t complain,” Wormington says, when I ask him how he thinks Tide’s campaign is being received. “People understand what we’re doing.”

At the same time, he tells me he feels like a duck in water: Everything appears smooth on the surface, but he’s kicking madly underneath.

A quick glance at his Tweetdeck reveals he’s tracking terms and phrases such as #LaundryLater, @Tide, #tidead, @EmilyHampshire_ and #SBLIV.

Molski’s Tweetdeck shows he’s monitoring much of the same, as well as the dreaded #TidePodChallenge.

A Twitter representative walks over to tell me that, based on third-party sentiment data, 99% of the conversation surrounding Tide’s #LaundryLater hashtag is positive.

Someone suggests that because the game is tied 10-10, they tweet out “Tied now, #LaundryLater.” Maxwell approves, and the post gets tweeted.

The halftime show finishes without Shakira eating a Tide Pod.

Second half

The game resumes, but the energy seems less focused than it was at the beginning. It feels like only half the people are back in their seats.

But everyone seems excited. Maxwell and Molski take turns reading out positive tweets praising Tide’s campaign.

“I think Tide won the Super Bowl,” states one tweet that Maxwell reads aloud.

Molski reads a longer message that’s gushing over the ads. “Is it by my mom?” quips one of the creatives.

Throughout the evening, Team Tide is busy responding to people on Twitter and retweeting links to articles written about the campaign on publications such as Hollywood Life, People and Uproxx. They’re also looking for small, quirky moments to jump on, such as footage of a guy in attendance who’s fast asleep. Or passed out. “Nap now, #laundrylater,” reads Tide’s corresponding tweet.

When someone on Twitter challenges the idea that if Charlie Day hasn’t pre-treated the stain on his shirt by now, “I don’t know how to help you.” Tide’s response: “No pre-treating necessary with Tide Power PODS.”

The 15-second Tide spot featuring Wonder Woman airs.

Maxwell’s Tweetdeck starts moving so rapidly that she simply throws her hands up out of excitement and inability to keep up.

Within about a minute of each other, three men in the room get texts from whom I assume are their male buddies asking if they actually got to meet Gal Gadot, Wonder Woman herself.

Procter & Gamble’s multi-brand ad runs, and the room gets quiet. Everyone remains quiet after it ends, too.

Maxwell explains that while Tide, like all brands in the P&G family, was invited to participate in the spot, they ultimately declined the offer. Tide had already developed its #LaundryLater concept, so it just didn’t mesh well with the idea of quickly cleaning up a big mess at a Super Bowl party.

By now, the long table is full of empty plastic cups, Blue Moons, Bud Lights and Diet Cokes.

At the two-minute warning, the final Tide spot airs. The room fills with clapping and laughter, and everyone’s Tweetdeck gets moving again.

The game ends. The Kansas City Chiefs have won. Someone pops a bottle of Champagne, and everyone cheers.

As the night winds down, Maxwell tells me she couldn’t be happier. She also tells me she had a budget to spend on paid social, but hardly used any of it because the organic pickup was more than sufficient. She declined to share specific numbers. It seems tagging the wrong Emily Hampshire in the brand’s pinned tweet was the night’s biggest flub.

Before everyone gets up to go, Maxwell gives a toast. She says she can’t thank everyone enough. “We were in the trenches in this one,” she says. “Talk about a family table.”

She raises her glass and ends with, “Cheers now, and laundry later!”