It’s cool to hang out in front of 7-Eleven? It always has been.
Bring up 7-Eleven on your Instagram feed and amidst the usual selfies with slurpies and new food announcements, there is a surprising amount of car content.
Car enthusiasts tag 7-Eleven in their car photos of them parked in front of their stores and in return 7-Eleven shares them with their over half a million fans.
So why is a convenience store known more for Texas-sized beverages and lottery tickets sharing some arguably dope car photos?
It’s all part of knowing their customer and reminding a new generation what everyone’s known for the longest time, hanging out parked in front of a 7-Eleven, having your own mini-meet, is one of life’s simple pleasures.
What the convenience store means for younger crowds during a pandemic.
7-Eleven, as the name suggests, will always be that place for morning coffee and after-work scratchers for the OG working crowd. But for that Instagram demographic, new to the workforce or still in school, life behind a laptop seriously threw a wrench in how a younger demo interacted with their corner store.
No longer was 7-Eleven that buffer spot to get some food or just hang out before school or after work. Now, you mostly head to the convenience store because you have to, not because your normal schedule passes by one.
But what if 7-Eleven wasn’t just a place for food, drinks, and lottery before work and school? What if it was just a fun spot to…hang out?
I’m sure 7-Eleven noticed a lot of car enthusiasts tagging them over the past couple of years parked out in front of their stores, more so these past couple of months than ever before.
With most organized car meets dwindling to a trickle thanks to stay at home orders and local police cracking down on street racing, 7-Elevens became their own place for a mini-car meet.
For car enthusiasts, it’s a place to snap photos and hang out and if police drive by, they’re paying customers patronizing a local store. Business as usual.
7-Eleven understood the assignment, share some car photos redefining the front of their stores as car enthusiast friendly and, in return, the car enthusiasts get a couple of follows and likes for some of that precious clout.
A win-win.
It’s probably not that serious, it might just be for the aesthetic.
If you’re a fan of JDM cars, you’ve probably come across a lot of car shots from Japan, their owners parked in front of FamilyMarts, the Japanese equivalent to our 7-Eleven. They’re everywhere in Asia.
Seeing those photos, I always wondered why didn’t we make our own 7-Elevens ubiquitous with informal car hangs here in the United States like they do with FamilyMarts.
Just like most trends that start in Asia, it looks like we’re now catching up.
Day or night, 7-Elevens give a great excuse for car enthusiasts to take pictures of their car. During the day, we’re just picking up something quick, might as well snap a photo for the ‘gram.
At night, the back-lit parking lot is the perfect spot for some low-light photography, no flash needed. There’s something inherently pleasing seeing your car parked backwards, bathed in the artificial fluorescent light of your local 7-Eleven.
Instagram is home to all things aesthetic and we’re just providing 7-Eleven with free content and advertising.
Thanks for sharing our car photos
Thanks 7-Eleven for confirming what I knew to be true all along, the front of 7-Eleven, loiterers and sketchy situations aside, is mostly a cool place to park and spend a half hour hosting your own informal car meet.
[…] 5 at 6 P.M. would be a good time for a car meet. They, like many fans of 7-Eleven on social media, noticed 7-Eleven enjoys sharing tagged car photos. So, why not organize a car meet this coming Friday just […]