- The official TikTok account for the Planters nut brand asked viewers for ideas for theme songs.
- In an October video, the brand asked users to “write our jingle” using the app’s duet function.
- TikTokers responded with unsafe texts that heavily played on puns with the word “nut”.
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On October 22nd, the Planters TikTok account asked viewers to write a new jingle for the brand in honor of National Nut Day. In the weeks since the video was released, the request has unfolded into chaos: users skip serious texts to directly engage in sexual puns with the word “nut”.
The official TikTok site for the nut brand Planters, dubbed @mrpeanutoriginal in honor of their mascot, has roughly 277,000 followers. It usually posts animated advertisements, entering sweepstakes the brand runs, and videos associated with characters close to Mr. Peanut like Baby Nut.
For their latest audience engagement effort, the brand asked creators to use TikTok’s “Duet” feature to sing along to a piano-based beat. The original video associated with the campaign has around 64,500 likes and 1.2 million views.
Now around 3,800 TikTok users appear to have answered the call based on the number of videos associated with the original sound.
While the jingles the Planters account posted on its official TikTok mostly featured healthy puns with the words “nuts” or “nut”, the most viral responses to the brand’s appeal were more sexual in nature. Some of the videos have lyrics like “peanut butter up my butt”, “Mr. Peanut put them nuts in my mouth” and “I could put these nuts up my butt”.
The top posts have amassed millions of views.
“I happen to be a fan of pudding …” TikTok user Ella Watkins (@ ella.whatkins) raps over the Mr. Peanut beat, the words are in a caption. “PUDDIN DEEZ NUTZ looks good in your mouth.”
The video uploaded on Friday has been viewed over 4.8 million times and has around 1 million likes.
“As if you think Mr. Peanut should hire me,” Watkins wrote in a comment with 30,200 likes.
This response follows previous meme patterns on TikTok, where serious requests for audience participation – especially from brands or celebrities – aren’t always well received. Users previously made fun of singer Ed Sheeran for asking for duets for his song “Afterglow” in 2020 and drowning it out with tubas, snare drums and electric guitars instead of harmonizing with their voices.
Many users also accused the company of soliciting freelance workers, interpreting the duet request as a songwriting contest for a jingle that would be used in future marketing collateral.
“Let me rephrase, ‘Hey guys, we need a new jingle, but we don’t want to spend any money on it,'” read a comment with 32,900 likes on the original Planters video.
“Why don’t you pay someone instead of asking for free work,” said another comment on the video with almost 1,400 likes.
A Planters spokesman told Insider that it will “enthusiastically compensate” any creators whose services it wishes to use for “paid media endeavors or other commercial purposes.” The spokesman told Insider that the duets he posted on his profile were shared with the permission of the creators themselves.
While the Planters spokesperson didn’t specifically address the NSFW nature of many duets, he said the brand on TikTok was “blown away from the record of musical performance and energy.”
The brand has previously made missteps on social media: Insider reported that prior to the character’s debut, the company had created meme pages for its “Baby Nut” character, who debuted in a 2020 Super Bowl ad. Twitter eventually banned three such Baby Nut accounts for violating its spam and platform tampering guidelines.
Of course, the name “Baby Nut” also sparked at least a few sexual “nut” jokes on social media.
Read more stories from Insider’s Digital Culture Desk.
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