Not all heroes wear capes. Some wear caps… bootleg RM Williams cord-style caps, more specifically. Let me explain.
About a month ago, the fellas over at Hats Greatest Hits (AKA “Australia’s most respected corduroy cap activist group”) mocked up 8 new cap designs and conducted a call-out. The aim? To let the people pick the target of their next campaign, a campaign that would ultimately put pressure on one of Australia’s most beloved companies to create their own cord cap.
Following the successes of Dan Murphy’s and BWS campaigns – “nothing confirmed yet, but they both sent very strong signals that they’d look into making the hats” – they found that RM was the next overwhelming favourite.
View this post on Instagram
“Then I thought, how can I make this hat even better?” Hats Greatest Hits’ Billy tells PEDESTRIAN.TV. “So I added an RM Williams style belt as the backstrap, and a boot style pull tag. The punters went crazy for it. So we launched the campaign targeting RMs page.”
And so it bloody began.
Punters began to bombard RM’s Instagram with blue hats, in solidarity with the valiant cause. And, uh, well, the comments kept coming…
And coming…
In response to thousands of cap-cravers clogging the comments section, RM Williams eventually blocked blocked both Hats Greatest Hits and the blue hat emoji from appearing in the comments. But eradicate the issue, it did not. “They thought by blocking me they’d stop the campaign in its tracks,” Billy tells us. “What they failed to realise is that this was a grass roots campaign powered by thousands of punters across the country, I was merely the spokesperson. It all backfired on RM, and hundreds of people got around the blocking by switching to other emojis. A bunch of people posted heartfelt pleas in the RM comments section, which got thousands of likes.”
“The pressure got too much…” This evening, RM Williams released an offical statement about the whole affair, saying that it “prides itself on listening to feedback and ideas”, ultimately encouraging users to comment the ‘applause’ emoji to register interest in a potential cord cap.
View this post on Instagram
HUGE. A WIN. THE CROWD GOES WILD.
How do the fellas feel after their campaign finally got the recognition it deserves? “Exhilarated, vindicated, ready to bury the hatchet, let bygones be bygones, and get the RM Williams cord (with the belt style backstrap and boot pull tag) over the line. All we were asking for was RM to hear us out and consider making what could be the greatest lid ever made, and that’s what they’ve done, so full credit to them.”
They now encourage us all to comment applause emojis on RM Williams’ Instagram page and continue garnering interest for the cap (that, let’s be real, is now inevitable). If anything’s for certain, it’s that you can’t get in the way of fashionable, patriotic Aussies and their selfless pursuit of a fine cord garment. The people have spoken, and we want the cap. Now.
Let’s all pour one out for the boys over at Hats Greatest Hits. You’ve done the lord’s work.
