What do rubber ducks have to do with Jeep?

They say that the best ideas are born from crises, and that seems to be the case of a Canadian woman named Allison Parliament. Born in a small town near Ontario and a big fan of Jeep, Parliament never imagined that a bag of toys would revolutionize the world of off-road fans.

The birth of Jeep ducking

In the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, Parliament saw a Jeep Wrangler parked somewhere and decided to leave a small souvenir for its owner. Earlier that day, she had had an argument with another driver in a gas station parking lot, and she wanted to change the vibe of a bad day by doing a nice gesture.

She had a bag of tiny rubber ducks, so she left one on the door of the vehicle with a message: “Cool Jeep.” Then she took a picture and shared it on Instagram with the hastag #DuckDuckJeep, never thinking that it would be the start of a real trend that, from 2020 to today, has been replicated around the world: Jeep ducking.

After the Instagram post, she decided to start a community on Facebook (which still exists) where all the Jeep fans began to post their own pictures, both with ducks they received and ducks they gave as gifts. Today there are more than 91,000 members. At the beginning this practice was limited to the Jeep Wrangler, but today it covers all models.

This new tradition is carried out both during long journeys and on everyday trips. The goal is simply to give someone else a moment of happiness through this gift, as can be seen in the images shared on X (formerly Twitter).

The #DuckDuckJeep craze on TikTok

By now, many thousands of videos and photographs have been shared on social media. A quick look on TikTok is enough to find Jeep ducking content with thousands and thousands of views: from customized ducks to ducks on the vehicle’s spare wheels or hood. Some drivers have their glove box and car compartments full of these toys, to give as gifts.

But the madness has gone even further, and the brand itself has not been able to ignore the rubber ducky revolution: at the Detroit Auto Show, held last month, Jeep captured everyone’s attention by displaying the largest rubber duck in the world.

What to do if there is a duck on your Jeep

First of all, you should post the photo on social media with the tag #DuckDuckJeep. After that, it is the driver’s decision: you can either display the trophy on your car’s dashboard or pass it on to the owner of another Jeep.

If you want to give one, the main rule is to leave it somewhere visible, like the windshield or the door handle. Some people like to give ducks that are the same color as the car.

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