A tale of two billboards: Weezer responds to Utahn's viral (but expensive) joke

MURRAY, Utah — A billboard that has delighted but baffled many residents of the Salt Lake area for the past few months has caught the attention of a platinum-certified rock band.

The billboard simply reads: "WEEZER," in giant comic sans font on a white background. It went up in early June at around 5800 S. State Street in Murray.

Then a little over four months later, a new billboard went up just a mile down the road, appearing to be a response directly from Weezer themselves.

"Thanks to whoever bought the billboard down the road. -Weezer," the sign said.

The band has not yet confirmed directly whether it paid for the billboard — but they DID post a video of it on TikTok and Instagram and tagged him, along with the message: "We're sending out a signal. Waiting on a callback from you" (lyrics from their song "What Happens After You?").

Weezer also tweeted a photo of each billboard with the caption "How it started vs how it's going" and a link to Winn's TikTok from June when he unveiled the purchase — in which Winn wrote that it was "an excellent use of company money."

The original video of the billboard on Lucca International's account has had 2 million views, but anyone driving past it on State Street who hasn't seen the video has surely wondered, "why?"

Winn talked to FOX 13 News on Sunday about the story behind the first billboard and his reaction to the shoutout from the band.

"Never in my wildest dreams did I think that just putting 'Weezer' on a billboard would warrant a response from the band themselves," he said. "It wasn't even a call out to them."

What was the reason, then, behind the $5,000-per-month bit? Winn said it began with a t-shirt design that he sells under his clothing company called Lucca International.

"It actually has the band members of Weezer on it in cartoon form, but it says 'I love One Direction on it," Winn said.

luccainternational.com

After that, he said his friend and business partner Creed Stump had a dream — "a brilliant dream" — that they needed to buy a billboard that said "WEEZER" on it, using "the worst font ever."

So that's exactly what they did.

"Our company is funding the entire thing," Winn said. "We're near broke because of it, but I don't mind."

"This is how I believe business is supposed to be done — with no direction, just visuals," he added.

Now that the stunt has caught Weezer's attention, what's next?

"I want to hang out," Winn said, "but I'd imagine they have better things to do than just spend their day with 22-year-olds."

But he intends to use the existing billboard to keep the back-and-forth going with the band.

"[We'll] likely exchange the panel we already have there, but I'd like to keep this little text message thing going with them, see how far we can take it," he said. "We have a message prepared, ready to go right now, and it'll get up ASAP."

That new message will be unveiled on State Street soon, as well on Winn's "Lucca International" Instagram page.