Blendtec · Will It Blend? YouTube Before Content Marketing

Blendtec is a Utah-based company founded by Tom Dickson in 1975, known for making commercial-grade blenders used in restaurants, smoothie shops, and similar food service businesses. The company also sold consumer blenders at a premium price point (typically $400–500 in 2006, versus $50–100 for comparable consumer products) — but was almost unknown among consumers, who had no reason to pay a premium for commercial-grade blending power when cheaper options were available.

The marketing challenge was classic high-quality, premium-priced product in a commodity category: how do you justify a 4–8× price premium to consumers who do not know why commercial-grade blending capacity matters? The answer Blendtec found was not to explain the features — it was to demonstrate them in the most memorable way possible.

Tom Dickson had a practice of testing Blendtec blenders by blending unusual materials — wood, golf balls, broom handles — to verify that the motors could handle extreme stress. Blendtec's marketing director, George Wright, joined the company in 2006 and observed Dickson performing these tests. Wright saw immediate content marketing potential: these demonstrations were entertaining, surprising, and directly demonstrated the product's core selling proposition (extraordinary blending power) in a way that no advertising could match.

Wright proposed making videos of these blending tests and posting them on the newly launched YouTube platform. The total production budget for the first batch of videos was approximately $50 — for the materials being blended (marbles, a rotisserie chicken, a rake handle, and other objects). Dickson dressed in a lab coat and safety goggles for the videos — creating a character that was both authoritative and absurd, which contributed to the entertainment value.

The first five "Will It Blend?" videos were posted to YouTube in November 2006 — within the platform's first 18 months of existence, before "video marketing" or "YouTube strategy" were recognised marketing categories. The videos followed a consistent format: Tom Dickson, in lab coat and goggles, introduces the object being blended with the question "Will it blend?" blends the object, and delivers a verdict ("It blends!" or "Yes, it blends!") to camera.

Within the first week, the videos had received approximately 6 million views — a remarkable number for 2006 YouTube, when the platform was still building its audience. The traffic included significant coverage on Digg (the dominant social news aggregator of that era), which drove a wave of viewers who then shared the videos across email and early social media platforms.

The "Will It Blend?" series spread virally through the tech community and beyond for several reasons: the concept was genuinely surprising and entertaining; each video had a clear "will it?" premise that created anticipation; the videos were short (under 2 minutes) and immediately watchable; and the blending results were visually spectacular — seeing an iPhone or a golf ball reduced to powder provided genuine spectacle that people wanted to share.

The series also benefited from the "iPhone effect": when Blendtec blended the first-generation iPhone shortly after its 2007 launch, the video generated enormous attention from the technology press and iPhone community — both of whom were fascinated by Apple's new device. Blending a highly anticipated, expensive product created a content moment that was simultaneously a demonstration of the blender's power and a piece of technology culture commentary.

Blendtec continued producing "Will It Blend?" videos over subsequent years, eventually producing over 250 episodes. The series introduced audience participation — asking YouTube users to suggest what Blendtec should blend next — creating community engagement and a stream of user-generated ideas. Popular suggestions became their own videos, creating a feedback loop between the audience and the content production.

Blendtec expanded the series to cover culturally relevant products and moments: blending each new iPhone model, blending glow sticks, blending Angry Birds toys. The consistent tactic of blending each new generation of iPhone created a reliable content event that generated press coverage each time Apple launched a new product — leveraging Apple's marketing events as a content creation calendar.

Tom Dickson stated in documented interviews that Blendtec's retail blender sales increased fivefold following the launch of the "Will It Blend?" series — attributing this growth directly to the series' awareness impact. This attribution is supported by the timeline: the sales growth coincided precisely with the series' viral spread, and Blendtec had not made other significant marketing changes at the same time.

The mechanism of the sales impact was straightforward: millions of YouTube viewers who had never heard of Blendtec now knew the brand, knew the product's primary selling proposition (extraordinary blending power), and associated the brand with entertainment and audacity rather than the generic blender category. When those viewers subsequently needed a blender or were given a recommendation for a blender, Blendtec was present in their consideration set in a way that competing brands at similar price points were not.

Blendtec's primary business was and remains commercial blenders for food service — a B2B category. The "Will It Blend?" series was created for consumer awareness but had significant B2B halo effects: restaurateurs and smoothie shop operators who saw the videos understood immediately that Blendtec's commercial-grade blending capacity was genuine. A video demonstrating that a Blendtec blender can reduce an iPhone to powder is more compelling product demonstration than any specification sheet.

For B2B buyers who were already considering commercial blenders, Blendtec's "Will It Blend?" videos provided the memorable brand differentiation that supported a purchase decision — the buyer could tell the story of the videos to justify the premium purchase to colleagues or managers, providing social proof language for the internal champion.

The "Will It Blend?" series is notable for its cost efficiency: the initial five videos were produced for approximately $50 in materials. The ongoing series cost modest amounts for the materials being blended (the most expensive were flagship iPhones and similar consumer tech products, costing a few hundred dollars each). The production itself was minimal — a blender, a camera, a lab coat, and Tom Dickson.

The return on this investment — measured in brand awareness, web traffic, and the documented fivefold increase in retail sales — represents one of the most efficient marketing spend-to-outcome ratios in the documented case study literature. Blendtec achieved awareness and sales results that would have cost millions in traditional television advertising, with a content investment of thousands of dollars.

The "Will It Blend?" YouTube channel (willitblend on YouTube) accumulated hundreds of millions of views across its library of over 250 videos. The series continued producing videos through the 2010s, adapting to new platforms (Facebook, Instagram) while maintaining the YouTube archive. The series demonstrates the long-tail value of video content: videos produced in 2006 and 2007 continued accumulating views years after production, providing ongoing organic reach without additional investment.

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