A viral tweet caused $10,000 in SEPTA merch sales — in one day

How much is one viral tweet worth? Almost a quarter million dollars of sales if you ask SEPTA.

According to the transportation agency’s annual report, a viral post about SEPTA-branded merch from its physical and online stores prompted a mega surge in sales throughout the holiday season.

It all started in late November, when Center City paralegal Chris Olley posted about a Philly-themed bar in Tokyo stocked with SEPTA pint glasses.

“I lost my mind when I saw SEPTA pint glasses at this Philly bar in Tokyo, so I googled it,” Olley wrote at the time. ”THERE IS A WHOLE LINE AND THEY ARE ALL ON CYBER MONDAY SALE FOR $4.87 PER PINT GLASS.” The post was viewed more than 160,000 times when first published.

Sales poured in, even temporarily selling out the pint glasses — and other items.

» READ MORE: SEPTA branded gifts are this season’s hottest gift. Here are our favorites.

It was enough for SEPTA to include a screengrab of the tweet in its annual report.

“In one single day, the store received over 200 orders totaling over $10,000 in sales,” SEPTA’s annual report said, citing Olley’s post as the catalyst.

SEPTA said the “fervor” for merch lasted all holiday season, accounting for 60% — or roughly $247,300 of annual sales.

“The fiscal report thing was funny,” Olley said. “I kind of thought this was all quieting down now, but someone tweeted that at me while I was at work, and that was about as surreal as seeing I sold out their pint glasses in the break between my classes the first time. It was cool seeing the numbers behind it too. I knew I drove some sales their way, but I didn’t realize just how much.”

For Olley, who grew up in Lawncrest and relies on public transit, he says he was already known as “the SEPTA guy” by friends, it’s just the latest chapter in a wild party anecdote.

“It was actually kind of a slow burn for me compared to the deluge of orders the SEPTA Store staff had to fill all at once,” he told The Inquirer. “I had a lot of Twitter notifications, and I had a fun trip to the store about a week later to pick up my orders and a little gift bag they threw together for me as a ‘thank you.’”

Later, when the owners of the Japanese bar visited Philly, Olley was invited to meet them at the SEPTA Transit Store.

» READ MORE: How a Philly-themed bar in Tokyo recreated a picture-perfect cheesesteak 6,700 miles away

“I don’t own a car and I’ve been taking SEPTA everywhere since I was 14, so I guess it just resulted in more people knowing me,” he said. “When I see SEPTA clothes in the wild now, I do laugh though — like, I kind of did that.”

Olley shared that SEPTA has given him two gift bags in appreciation, including a cozy Broad Street Line hoodie that he wore all winter.

“The store is really nice and has a cool selection of books and maps beyond all the clothes and toys and all that,” he said. “I love dropping in and just browsing sometimes and it’s nice to see that they have foot traffic when I pop in.”

SEPTA shared that it plans to expand and refurbish its physical store and add to its existing merch lines, something Olley describes as “gratifying.”

And for Olley, it all comes back to unapologetic city pride.

“This is very much not a meme or whatever,” he said. “Posting about SEPTA is entirely about my thoughts on making the system better and getting the city and the commonwealth to prioritize public transit. And it’s informed by riding SEPTA every day for almost 20 years, having ridden every single route at one point or another, and knowing the system inside and out like an encyclopedia.”

As for what makes him the proudest of this whole saga?

Olley had the foresight to purchase his own cart’s worth of pint glasses from the SEPTA store before sending his tweet.

“I threw out all the glasses in my cupboard and literally all my glasses are just SEPTA glasses now,” he said. “One for each of their lines.”