Besides watching football, drinking on Super Bowl Sunday is a familiar ritual. There are tailgating parties, pub events where you watch the big game, and pre and post-game parties where you celebrate or drink away your sorrow at your team losing. Because alcohol is such a huge part of Super Bowl Festivities, big brands take part in a little double duty media where they promote their brand and, at the same time, ask the public to not drink and drive.
You’ve probably seen the Budweiser commercials that ask you not to drink and drive, but this year there is something new on the horizon: Tostitos, Uber, and Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) have partnered to create something called the “Party Safe” bag for Super Bowl snackers.
That bag has the power to fulfill your munchie craving with delicious tortilla chips, but it also has the power to detect if you’ve been drinking. How is that even possible? Each party bag has alcohol sensors and those sensors are able to detect any trace of alcohol on a person’s breath.
If you haven’t had any alcohol at all and you’re eating your chips, the bag will turn green and you can go ahead, grab your keys, and drive home. If you’ve been drinking and the bag turns red, it will show the message “Don’t Drink And Drive.” The bag will then offer you a $10 credit for an Uber ride that’s only valid on February 5th; SuperBowl Sunday.
Incredibly, the bag also has NFC (near-field communication) technology built in. For the non-tech savvy, that means the chip-eater can just tap his or her phone against the chip bag to call Uber.
Although this is a really unique way to draw attention to the fact that you need to find yourself a ride home after drinking, there’s also one important thing to keep in mind: the bag will not measure your blood alcohol concentration (BAC).
That means you shouldn’t really use a bag of Tostitos to determine whether you should drink and drive. Not only is there the possibility it might not detect the alcohol on your breath when you’ve been drinking, there’s no safe amount of alcohol you can drink before you should drive.
Enjoy Super Bowl Sunday by planning for your ride home before you drink, and if your Tostitos bag does turn red, you won’t have to worry about how you’ll get home.
