the Stanley Cup

By: Grace tripp

We have all heard of the Stanley Cup; many relate this to the hockey series that ends with the winner being called the Stanley Cup champion, but in recent times, a new Stanley Cup has emerged. The Stanley tumbler cup, released in 2016, has become an online phenomenon with millions looking to own the cup. Walk into any school, workplace, or social setting, and you will see the large tumblers cups. These cups are incredibly popular, and the majority of its popularity is seen among girls. The cups' popularity originally started in 2019, when the cups gained popularity on platforms like TikTok, and because of this, Stanley cups became a massive trend among girls' culture. Since 2019, the rise in popularity of Stanley Cups has become a critical example of the power of social media in impacting girlhood trends. To better research my questions about Stanley Cups and their effects on girls’ culture, I will be using class readings, academic articles, and news websites to compose a historical background of the Stanley Cup trend and how its rise to popularity impacts the multiple aspects of girl culture. Combining all this, I will analyze the way Stanley cups have used social media to directly influence girls and how that influence shapes girls' culture in ways through consumerism, trend culture, and class exclusion.

Girlhood was originally thought to be a biological period in a girl's life that is supposed to end when the girl reaches a certain age; many scholars have gone against this idea and defined it as much more. According to Helgren, “Girlhood is further constructed by institutions such as family, school, youth organizations, and reformatories, as well as by religion, literature, the media, and discourses of child psychology and development” (pg 841). This idea that girlhood is socially constructed relates to the Stanley Cup trend, which shows how popular items and trends affect girls.

This then relates to the study of girlhood, which has become its own academic field. This field looks at the many factors that influence girls' behaviors, and how girlhood has become a wider variety of things, letting girls be free to make their stereotypes. Pomerantz described the study as, “girl is a broad, contested, and diverse term that is intersected by gender, race, class, sexuality, age, and nationhood, girlhood studies scholars focus on contextualizing girlhood across periods, regions, and identity categories to move away from a universal, dehistoricized understanding of the girl” (pg. 846). Stanley Cups would now be studied under these categories because the cup showcases how material items affect girl culture while also highlighting that many trends fail to incorporate lower-class girls.

Stanley cups were not always the 40-oz tumblers we see now. According to Ward, “Stanley was known for practical vacuum-sealed flasks, carried by camping enthusiasts and construction workers”. This water bottle was redesigned in 2016 due to lack of sales because of the niche audience Stanley had before, according to Ward, “In 2016, it released the Quencher. Featuring a straw and handle, the cup generated little interest until the following year, when it was uprooted by Utah Instagram account "The Buy Guide”. This then led into the cups peak popularity, social media was the main reason for its popularity. One Instagram account “The Buy Guide” started the social media wave for Stanley, this then led other accounts to buy and promote the cup.

Stanley Cup didn't just release this one tumbler, they used the popularity they were gaining on social media to expand their brand. Lee describes the social media tactics Stanley uses to create sales, their social media posts are described as, “these posts were designed to showcase Stanley's durable and functional design, often emphasizing new releases and limited-edition products”. Stanley uses social media to promote their aesthetic while also promoting their new releases. These new releases and limited edition products are essential to their popularity, and they connect to girl culture. This is because girls love to have the newest or rarest products, so these releases influence them to buy more of the product. Stanley has used social media to effectively grasp their audience's attention and create a desire to buy more of their products.

While looking at Stanley cups the main outlook of how the cups got popular is through social media. While looking at social media through a girlhood studies perspective we can see the positive and negative sides to social media. On the positive side social media allows girls to participate in self-expression but this is to a certain extent. Social media mainly works as a guideline to how girls should express themselves, Kanai better explains this, “I suggest that interrogating online spaces as sociality for girls as potentially disciplinary sites gives some explanatory power to common practices of identity by girls and young women with mainstream, regulatory postfeminist themes”(pg. 83). This highlights the importance of studying social media as a place that controls and guides girls behavior.

This control is seen in many other ways on social media, one mainly is unrealistic material items and consumerism patterns. With social media, girls are seeing influencers and celebrities buy and have the newest product. This is unrealistic, and only wealthy people can keep up with this pattern. According to Papageorgiou, “girls can now easily and frequently compare themselves to those they follow on Instagram, whether they are peers or celebrities” (pg. 2). This reiterates that social media fosters unrealistic consumer expectations among girls, which leads girls to believe they need the newest product to be an acceptable girl. Social media influencers and celebrities promote this luxurious lifestyle as something normal, but this standard is unrealistic. This being seen as the norm then creates pressure on girls to achieve these unrealistic lifestyle patterns, which then causes insecurity among girls, leading to social media ultimately hurting girls.

One big social media scandal Stanley buyers were seen participating in is the limited edition Starbucks x Stanley Quencher. This limited edition cup caused violence and chaos in multiple Target stores. The reason for the chaos was the massive want consumers had for this limited edition cup, this want caused massive reactions among consumers and according to Demopoulos for The Guardian, “My mom saw me fall, and she said it took a while for me to get back up,” Howard, who is a first-grade teacher, said. “But it's worth it, I think. I got the cup.”
This story portrays how far consumers were willing to go for the cup, people were falling and getting pushed all for a pink 40 oz tumbler. This relates negatively to girls' culture because girls are the main audience for these cups, and they were the majority who went to buy the limited edition cup. This then portrays girls being crazy consumers who will partake in violence to get an object.

Similarly, these consumer patterns are reflected in an overconsumption culture, which is heavily influenced by social media. In a study done by Frick, “We further found that social norms for consumption as well as exposure and attention to consumption-promoting online content were directly linked to aspiration levels, and from there indirectly linked to higher consumption levels” (pg. 10). This highlights the direct relation between online spaces and overconsumption. Many forms of this are directed at girls, with the multiple makeup trends, water bottle trends, and clothing trends that are commonly showcased online. Girls are then expected to buy an unrealistic number of things to keep up with social media culture. This then falls into overconsumption with many girls having multiple of one product because it was trending online.

While Stanley cups are typically marketed as environmentally friendly because they are reusable cups, this message can be compromised when users, especially girls, begin buying and collecting multiple cups. The idea of the cups being sustainable got removed when the cup became trendy; they became collectible items instead of a tool for reducing plastic water bottle waste. According to Klein, “she worries that the Quencher could become the next cotton tote bag, a product meant to serve as a sustainable alternative to single-use plastic that, due to its recent popularity and subsequent mass production, has become actively harmful to them environment”(Wired). Owning 4 to 5 tumblers is now the norm for many consumers, and this not only removes the environmentally friendly effect, but it can also work to cause harm to the environment. This then relates to the overconsumption aspect of many trends targeted at girls, and how these trends were originally designed to do good, but social media contradicts this. This shows us that sustainability marked at young girls is not truly about the environmental impact, but it is more likely about being trendy.

The popularity of Stanley cups in the girl world showcases how many consumer trends can exclude a large portion of girls. With Stanley Cup prices typically ranging from $25 to $50 per cup, and the desire many girls have for buying multiple cups, this can leave out a large range of girls whose families cannot financially afford the cup. This causes girls who can’t afford the cup to feel left out and excluded from other girls their age, especially when these cups are commonly a symbol of popularity among young girls. This exclusion is just another factor in girlhood studies that showcases materialistic trends causing harm to girls. It also highlights how materialistic trends can cause class divisions to leave girls feeling unworthy because they can’t afford what other girls can

In conclusion, the rise in popularity of the Stanley Cup as a girl world artifact, showcases the power of social media, consumerism, and trend culture on girlhood. What began as a water bottle meant for labor workers turned into a symbol of popularity and belonging for girls through the pressures of online culture. Looking at the trend through different girlhood angles helps us understand different issues like class exclusion, overconsumption, and the harm of having material items shape girls' identities. While social media allows for girls to participate in self expression it ultimately creates a pressure for them to follow certain trends. The Stanley cup shows how materialistic everyday items can shape girls' culture and affect girls' experiences.

References

Demopoulos, A. (2024, January 12). Stanley cups took the world by storm. Then the backlash began. The Guardian. Retrieved May 9, 2025, from https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/jan/12/stanley-cups-tumblers-water-bottl e-trend

Helgren, J. (2020). Girlhood. In D. T. Cook (Ed.), The SAGE encyclopedia of children and childhood studies (pp. 841–845). SAGE Publications. https://sk.sagepub.com/ency/edvol/the-sage-encyclopedia-of-children-and-childhood-stud ies/chpt/girlhood

Kanai, A. (2015). Thinking beyond the internet as a tool: Girls’ online spaces as postfeminist

structures of surveillance. In J. Bailey & V. Steeves (Eds.), eGirls, eCitizens: Putting technology, theory and policy into dialogue with girls’ and young women’s voices (pp. 83–106). University of Ottawa Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780776622590-005

Klein, E. (2024, January 11). The Big Problem With the Giant Stanley Cup. WIRED. Retrieved May 9, 2025, from https://www.wired.com/story/stanley-cup-quencher-environment/

Lee, R. M. Water Bottle War: Examining the Relationship Between the Consumer Identity of Water Bottles and the Digital Marketing Strategies of Competing Brands

Papageorgiou, A., Fisher, C., & Cross, D. (2022). “Why don’t I look like her?” How adolescent girls view social media and its connection to body image. BMC women's health, 22(1), 261. https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1186/s12905-022-01845-4.pdf

Pomerantz, S. (2020). Girlhood studies. In D. T. Cook (Ed.), The SAGE encyclopedia of children and childhood studies(pp. 846–850). SAGE Publications.https://sk.sagepub.com/ency/edvol/the-sage-encyclopedia-of-children-and-childhood-studies/chp t/girlhood-studies

Ward, M. (2024, January 13). What the tweens’ favourite water bottle says about them. Age [Melbourne, Australia]

https://link-gale-com.libserv-prd.bridgew.edu/apps/doc/A787312623/AONE?u=mlin_s_bridcoll &sid=googleScholar&xid=71ff12ed