AI has become unavoidable these days, with companies increasingly relying on it for everything from customer service to advertisements. However, a recent ad at a Cumberland Farms location in Massachusetts quickly went viral after viewers noticed something bizarre: a cup of coffee appeared to be priced at $99. The strange image left many wondering whether it was an AI mistake or if coffee prices had somehow spiraled completely out of control.
Reddit user Palavrao shared a picture of a Cumberland Farms advertisement urging users to enter their phone number at the pumps to get their coffee. The ad also says the offer applies to fuel purchases at $3.49 or higher. However, what caught everyone’s attention was that the two coffee cups in the image had a $99 price tag.
As you can imagine, this sent Redditors into a spiral, as many wondered whether the coffee was worth $99 or if they had to spend that much to get the cup.
While weird, many speculated that the company might have used AI on the image, and that the odd price tag on the cups might have been an error in the prompt the company used. Even without confirmation from the establishment on whether it used AI, some people think it is possible, as many other companies have reportedly used it and released other questionable images, such as this one.
Massachusetts Redditors Debate on Whether Cumby’s Used AI or Not
Since there isn’t any official information about AI usage in that particular Massachusetts Cumby’s advertisement image, Redditors started speculating and claiming it clearly looks AI-made, and, since it is a hot topic, they started criticizing the brand.
“Their graphic designer is probably AI. It’s notorious for typos in graphics.”
“I’m so sick of businesses using bad free AI to create graphics and then printing them. Aside from the $99 coffee, you also have margins all out of whack, branding that is poor, and the iced coffee looks like it is also steaming.”
Others saw this as more of a lighthearted mistake and started joking about the coffee’s price.
“Inflation is getting out of hand.”
In the end, even if this image has no AI in it, some think the design is weird: the $99 seems a bit misleading, and other elements make the image look strange.
