Maybe you can’t quantify those numbers, but they do add up

--- Rob Reilly, co-executive creative director of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, the agency behind the A Burger King promotion to give people hamburger vouchers in exchange for dumping Facebook friends, reported in "The Value of a Facebook Friend? About 37 Cents", Jenna Wortham for the New York Times BITS section, January 9, 2009

Context from the story:

To earn their free burger, users download the Whopper Sacrifice Facebook application and dump 10 unlucky friends deemed to be unworthy of their weight in beef. After completing the purge, users are prompted to enter their addresses and the coupons are sent out via snail mail.

. . . .

“Choosing 10 people can take a lot of time,” said Mr. Reilly. “There’s at least an hour’s worth of people’s eyes on your brand. Maybe you can’t quantify those numbers, but they do add up.”

Besides, he added, “we aren’t giving the burgers away -– you have to sacrifice. You are paying for it but the currency is different.”

What price is Burger King placing on a Facebook friendship? At a suggested retail price of $3.69 for the Angry Whopper sandwich, customers are trading each deleted friend for about 37 cents’ worth of bun and beef.