These days Instagram is pretty much beyond parody, with the average feed full to the brim of preening narcissists continually uploading moronic 'selfies' with sociopathic hashtags like #me and #metoday or just inane pictures of coffee toppings. We've all seen the people in restaurants finding a contrived filtered image of their food more appetizing than the actual thing. In a nice twist of marketing though, one restaurant has taken this modern fixation and made it part of their menu.
Diners at the newly opened Comodo in New York will be encouraged to photograph their food (as normal) but make sure to include the hashtag #ComodoMenu which uses Instagram to collate all the other guests images together. This creates a photographic menu for the diners to go with the stuffy old analogue papery thing they give you when you sit down.
This writer's opinions on Instagram aside, the idea is a great one, tapping into a burgeoning trend that encompasses over 100 million users and counting. It's a great way to get social buzz going on around a restaurant, venue or a product and makes the user feel like they are contributing to the success of something that they are enjoying.
It is surely only a matter of time before this kind of marketing takes hold wholesale, for as we saw with Twitter and the eventual implementation of hashtags on television programmes all it takes is the marketing nous to figure out what people do socially and get them to do it to promote your brand.
So thanks Comodo, for making a deplorable modern day habit justified and for opening the floodgates for this type of marketing campaign in every 'youth-orientated' pastime.