Except you’ve been living under a rock, you must be familiar with this guy on TikTok—Ashton Hall, who recently posted a video called “The morning routine that changed my life 3:50 AM to 9:30 AM.” 

It’s one of those videos you can’t stop watching, even if you're not sure why.

It starts off wild, with a taped mouth, brushes his teeth, and dunks his face in a bowl of ice water. Then there’s some journaling, more ice water, a gym workout, swimming, rubbing banana peels on his face, and one more dramatic dunk into the icy bowl, this time while wearing a full outfit. It’s intense, borderline unhinged, and for some reason, weirdly fascinating.

But in the middle of all that chaos, people noticed something unexpected: the water Ashton was using came from a fancy-looking blue bottle, “Saratoga Water”.

Now here’s where it gets interesting. Ashton didn’t shout out Saratoga. He didn’t tag them. There was no brand deal. He just poured it, casually, and people noticed. Since then, Saratoga Water has been everywhere. It’s not that people are intentionally hyping it or anything like that, they’re just making memes, spoofs, and commentary videos, and that blue bottle keeps popping up in all of them. And now? Saratoga is trending.

What’s even funnier is that people might be laughing at the video, but Ashton is kind of winning too. He’s gained a bunch of followers, and his video sparked a whole conversation online. Even if people are joking about it, they’re still watching. A lot. He’s getting the kind of reach most content creators dream about.

And Saratoga? They basically got free advertising from the internet. 

The visibility they’re getting is priceless. The bottle is now instantly recognizable to millions of people including myself who may have never even heard of the brand before.

This wasn’t planned at all, which is probably why it worked. People love catching stuff that feels “real,” even if it’s part of a super exaggerated routine.

This isn’t the first time something like this has happened either. Some other random moments that turned into business wins:

• Ocean Spray blew up after a TikTok where a guy skateboards while sipping Cran-Raspberry juice and vibing to Fleetwood Mac. Their sales spiked and the CEO even bought the guy a truck.
• Stanley Cups went from niche to necessity after blowing up on TikTok, becoming the emotional support water bottle people take everywhere, from gyms to grocery runs. The result? Their revenue jumped from $73 million in 2019 to over $750 million by 2023.
• Feta Cheese: Remember the baked feta pasta trend? It caused shortages across grocery stores after a single TikTok recipe went viral. Sales of feta spiked by over 200% in some regions.

The lesson here is kind of simple: customer behavior can be the fastest growth hack. You can plan for months, run all the ads in the world, but sometimes all it takes is the internet grabbing onto something unexpected and running with it.

The real challenge isn’t going viral. It’s what happens next. Saratoga is now sitting on a cultural moment.

The product is trending. But virality is a wave, it’s fast, unpredictable, and often fleeting.

The challenge now is retention. How do you turn a cameo in a viral moment into long-term customer loyalty? 

Saratoga can hold onto this viral moment by subtly acknowledging it on social media, leaning into the cool, premium aesthetic, improving online visibility, highlighting its health benefits, exploring a light collaboration with Ashton, and staying present through partnerships with calm, wellness-focused creators. They do have a lot of options, it’s up to their marketing team right now to cook.

Ashton’s video will definitely fade in a few days. But if Saratoga plays this right? That blue bottle might just stick around for a long time.