My name is Keith Peterson, and I’m doing something crazy. I’m biking from Phoenix, AZ to Denver, CO for a job interview with Red Bull.

When I told a friend I was planning on doing this, he asked me, “Why?” I responded by saying, “Because nobody else has.”

I like to think of myself as a thinker. I’m a big idea guy who likes to scale down plans, not up. When I heard about the job opening for which I applied, I knew I was going to have to do something different to get noticed. I have a friend who works there. I heard how progressive Red Bull was. They haven’t managed to hold 50% of the energy drink market share while hundreds of competitors come and go by sticking to the principles in Branding 101. 

Red Bull is a fun, creatively bold company that thinks outside the box, even though no one who works there would use the cliché’ “think outside the box” because to do so would be thinking inside the box.

It’s a company that thinks differently. A lot differently. I knew I had to, too.   

Sure, I could fly there. My resume is probably good enough to get me an interview without pulling this stunt. But this isn’t a stunt. It’s a lesson in branding. Only in this case I’m the product.

And this isn’t Jojo the Clown’s Energy Drink. It’s Red Bull - the Yankees of energy drinks, minus the overpaid pitchers. I could tell them what makes me a dynamic, adventure-minded maverick who loves a good challenge and thrives on orchestrating big ideas, or I could show them.

I’m going to show them.