After tweeting a photo of the note left in his unlocked car from a thief who stole only the Kit Kat candy bar he’d been keeping in the cup holder, Hunter Jobbins, freshman in athletic training, received many responses on social media, eventually also catching the attention of prominent media, such as The Huffington Post and BuzzFeed.
Left my car for maybe 15 minutes in front of the dorms and I come back to this. College man pic.twitter.com/KlDx5BtXLX
— Hunter Jobbins (@jabbins) October 30, 2016
When Kit Kat caught wind of the news, the company responded to Jobbins, tweeting him an offer to replace his stolen candy bar.
Kit Kat did, in fact, replace Jobbins’ Kit Kat — by filling his car with 6,500 Kit Kats, which were given away for free on the front lawn of Haymaker Hall Thursday evening. Jobbins and helpers representing Kit Kat handed out Kit Kats to anyone who attended the event and asked for some.
Sam and Jason Jobbins, Hunter’s mother and father, traveled to Manhattan from their home in Colwich, Kansas, to attend the Kit Kat giveaway event.
Hunter had been visiting his parents for the weekend and had taken a Twix and a Kit Kat from home for the road before returning to Manhattan, Sam said. Not long after she received a text message from Hunter saying that he made it back to Manhattan safely, Sam saw her son’s tweet about the Kit Kat thief.
“I actually texted him and I said, ‘Hunter, you need to lock your car,'” Sam said. “And the next morning, he texted me at work and said that it was just blowing up on social media.”
Hunter’s roommates, Aaron Meyer, freshman in food science, and Sam Lubbers, freshman in finance, said they expected Hunter’s tweet to be popular, but never expected anything as big as the crowded Kit Kat giveaway to come of it.
“We took bets on how many likes and retweets he’d get,” Meyer said. “I said 60,000, and he beat that by the next morning.”
Hunter’s original tweet about the Kit Kat thief now has 180,000 retweets and 480,000 likes.
The Kit Kat thief story is a fun one that allows followers a break from intense political news, Sam said.
“I thought it was hilarious that something like that could become such a big thing, but I guess maybe people are tired of politics and they like something funny and cute,” Sam said.
Hunter, who gave away many of his Kit Kats to attendees of the giveaway event, but was left with plenty do what he pleases with, said he does not have any idea who the Kit Kat thief is, but wishes he did because he would like to share his spotlight — and, yes, his Kit Kats — with him or her.
“If the Kit Kat thief is reading this or keeping up with this, I would love for you to come and tell me, and I’ll give you a big hug, a thank you and a lot of Kit Kats,” Jobbins said.
