Mockingbird Pie

Who’s the more foolish – the fool, or the fool who follows him?

- Obi-wan Kenobi, Star Wars

April Fools day brings out the creative types at all sorts of companies and it’s not surprising that those right-brainers over at  Think Geek pulled off one of the best pranks I’ve seen with their Tauntaun Sleeping Bag.

And I thought they smelled bad on the outside.

Why this works as an April Fools joke:

1. It fits with the brand

The trick with April Fools gags is that they have to be realistic enough to have you going, most of the ones that I saw this year were so obvious that you knew before you finished reading them. Yeah Google and Sherrin, I’m looking at you. Amusing, but I doubt anyone thought for a second that the G-ball was real.

Think Geek already sells ridiculously awesome Star Wars fan boy merch like Star Wars Cookbooks and R2-D2 Pepper grinders, is it really that difficult to imagine they would sell a sleeping bag as well?

2. It looks real because it is real

This prank is so convincing, because some chick actually made the sleeping bag! (Electricsoup, sorry I can’t find your real name). Check out her photos. I mean unless you have an amazingly good master from the Photoshop Guild at your work you can’t fake a picture like that.

Honourable mentions for keeping it real need to go out to the BBC’s Flying Penguins from 2008 with Terry Jones narrating (there are still people commenting on the YouTube page how they can’t believe it!)

3. People want it

My husband argued with me as whether this was real, he wanted to order one for our nephew and was devastated that they didn’t make one for large geeky white males. It wasn’t until he clicked on the ‘Buy Now’ button that the prank was revealed for what it really was.

In fact, it appears that so many people thought it was real and wanted their very own Tauntaun belly to curl up in that ThinkGeek are trying to actually make the sleeping bag.

Continue reading Who's the more foolish: 5 ways to create a convincing April Fools prank