This week’s award for best marketing promotion related to the election goes to AirBed & Breakfast, the peer-to-peer pad crashing site for travelers. (You list how much per night you want for travelers to stay on your floor, and they book through the site). Today, I received a package from AirBed & Breakfast containing the two boxes of cereal pictured above: Obama O’s and Cap’n McCain’s. In addition to the physical boxes of cereal, there are two catchy jingles for each cereal (embedded below), and a Webpage where you can vote for the cereal you prefer.

What does this have to do with AirBed & Breakfast? To promote the service, the startup is encouraging people across the country to put up get-out-the-vote volunteers for each campaign. Hosts can order a box of whichever cereal they prefer and serve it for breakfast. Except each box costs $39, and the company only made 500 of each. (If they make more, that could be their business model, at least for a month).

I just really like the design. The front of the Obama O’s box is stamped with “Hope In Every bowl” and on the back it calls itself the “Breakfast of Change.” The McCain character on the Cap’n McCain’s box is appropriately wearing a naval officer’s uniform, and the side of the box sings the praise of eating squares (inside the box are repackaged Quaker Puffs; the Obama O’s are really Honey O’s). The copy on the side of the Cap’n McCain’s box could have been written by his campaign:

Os may look pretty, but have you ever noticed there’s something missing? That’s right, there’s a hole in the middle of every O. With Cap’n McCain’s you get a whole piece of cereal in every bite.

It also points out that “Squares Are Stackable” and that “Squares Keep America Regular.” But the Obama O’s jingle is catchier. Have a listen:

Obama O’s

Captn McCain