The solution
In 2022 Instacart sponsored the MTV VMAs to launch 'The World Is Your Cart', its biggest-ever brand campaign, pivoting grocery delivery from a transactional utility to inspiration. The plan centered on a Lizzo film and celebrity shoppable carts — but the red carpet itself, the night's most-watched real estate, was closed to the product: the event banned outside food.
Droga5 answered the ban literally. Designer trio threeASFOUR built 'Cart Couture', a gown inspired by a shopping cart and woven with edible snack textures — rock candy, gum balls, gummy bears — worn by SNL's Chloe Fineman. She arrived snacking on her own dress, and every red-carpet photo became a product shot.
The stunt hacked the event's own rule: fashion is not only allowed on a red carpet, it is the entire point — so the press covered Instacart's groceries as style news, a section the brand could never otherwise enter.
Cart Couture anchored the VMA launch of the broader campaign led by CMO Laura Jones, in which celebrities like Lizzo published browsable, shoppable carts inside the app. The work earned seven shortlisted entries at The One Show 2023.
What it achieved
If food is banned, wear the delivery
Why it worked
The ban was converted from obstacle into plot — 'food so determined it arrived as couture' is a story press retells for free.
Fashion coverage put a grocery app into entertainment media no media plan could buy credibly.
The dress embodied the campaign thesis: a cart can be an object of desire, not a chore.
One wearable prop generated more coverage than a conventional sponsorship logo package ever could.
What can be applied
Treat a venue's ban as a creative brief: when the product can't enter as itself, disguise it as something the venue celebrates — the constraint becomes the story.
Aftermath
The stunt headlined Instacart's 2022 brand relaunch, which expanded into celebrity carts and new shoppable formats through Droga5. Instacart went public on Nasdaq in September 2023 under the ticker CART, with the inspiration-over-transaction positioning still central to its consumer marketing.
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