2012 Consumer Electronics Show Features Snooki, Justin Bieber Promoting Tech Products
The 2012 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) kicked off Tuesday in Las Vegas and features tech products sponsored by celebrities like Snooki, Justin Bieber and 50 Cent.
CES took place in the Las Vegas Convention Center where Snooki, from MTV's reality series, Jersey Shore, sat at a booth promoting a line of designer headphones from iHip.
The audio accessories company built the headphones around the things Snooki likes, according to CNN. Amanda Breault, spokeswoman for iHip, said that they approached Snooki, whose real name is Nicole Polizzi, to help build buzz around their products.
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"We built the line around the things she likes, like animal prints and bling. She designed everything to fit her attitude and her fashion sense," Breault said. "We knew that by having her, we could instantly attract fans, sponsors, press. The response has been tremendous."
According to CNN, hundreds of people crowded the iHip booth, flashing their cameras and trying to get a peak of Snooki. She patiently sat a table where she smiled at fans and signed autographs.
Rapper and businessman, 50 Cent was also at CES to promote his line of designer headphones. He revealed two models, the wireless Sync by 50 and the wired Street by 50, which hit the market in December.
"CES is exciting," he said. "But so many amazing things don't have proper marketing in place yet, so people won't get a chance to see them."
Justin Bieber is expected to make an appearance on Wednesday, for TOSY, a robotics company that will be unveiling an "entertainment robot," according to CNN.
Gadget analyst Andrew Eisner of Retrevo said that celebrity endorsements like these can help attract people to the product, but doesn't mean the product will necessarily sell.
"They definitely help attract people to the booth. You see people all crowding around the booth, and they're not looking at the new Bluetooth headset or whatever, they're taking pictures of the celebrity," Eisner said. "But whether it carries any weight beyond CES, I don't know."
Eisner added that a celebrity endorsement makes the most sense if the person has expertise about the product.
Countless other celebrities also made appearances at CES, promoting a wide range of different products. Dennis Rodman showed up to promote Paltalk, an app that makes calls and sends text messages to any other Paltalk user over 3G and Wifi, according the to the Washington Post.
Fellow NBA retirees, Robert Horry and John Salley helped celebrity chef Allison Fishman introduce new cooking appliances for Haier America.
Rappers LL Cool J and Ludacris were also there to promote their brands of designer headphones. Wayne Brady, Miss America 2011 (Teresa Scanlan) and the dancecrew, Jabbawockeez were also at CES promoting products.
