girl eating laundry detergent in Tide Pod Challenge

Tide has drafted New England Patriots tight end Rob “Gronk” Gronkowski to school teens on the danger of participating in the viral Tide Pod Challenge, according to PR Week. The trend involves people filming themselves eating laundry detergent pods and challenging others to do the same.

Tide posted a video on Twitter and Facebook featuring Gronkowski telling teens to avoid the social media craze.

"What the heck is going on, people? Use Tide pods for washing, not eating," Gronkowski said. "Do not eat."

The video has been retweeted more than 50,000 times and liked more than 100,000 times on Twitter. Gronkowski also tweeted the video from his own account, getting 9,000 retweets and 29,000 likes. The video has been viewed 44,000 times on Facebook.

Tide is also working with the American Cleaning Institute to inform and provide assets to post-secondary education institutions to educate their students to only use the product to clean clothes.

The public safety push builds on the brand’s multi-year effort to reduce accidental detergent exposure and to ensure liquid laundry packets are used safely.

Tide offers safety tips related to the detergent pods. Though they are geared toward keeping the detergent from the hands of small children in the home, school custodial workers can adapt them for students.

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