- DoorDash has named Jacob Batalon the "CEO" of CringeMart, its in-app storefront for embarrassing purchases, directly referencing his 2019 "CEO of Sex" meme.
- The spot has Batalon joking about customers chanting "CEO" at him in the family-planning aisle before unrolling a giant receipt as a punchline.
- CringeMart launched on August 3, 2026, with curated sections like "Go Piss Girl" (UTI tests) and "Daily Dump" (laxatives); DoorDash says more than 4 million customers bought awkward essentials between April 2025 and April 2026.
- This is Batalon's third Spider-Man-adjacent brand campaign of 2026, following July deals with Liquid I.V. and Samsung Galaxy.
DoorDash has handed Jacob Batalon a new title: “CEO” of CringeMart, the app’s in-app storefront for purchases people would rather not explain out loud.
The casting reaches back to 2019, when a Reddit user paired a photo of Batalon in a gray suit from the “Spider-Man: Homecoming” premiere with the caption “CEO of Sex.”
Batalon had nothing to do with the joke, but it stuck, circulating for years because he looked, as fans put it, like a strangely convincing startup founder.
In the new ad, Batalon plays up the bit, introducing himself as the store’s chief executive, joking about families chanting “CEO” at him in the family-planning aisle, and unrolling a giant receipt as a punchline about order lengths. He closes by inviting viewers to shop CringeMart through the DoorDash app.
CringeMart opened as an in-app category on August 3, letting shoppers browse curated sections such as “Go Piss Girl” for UTI tests and “Daily Dump” for laxatives.
DoorDash’s head of brand social, Zaria Parvez, has described the concept as creator-led, building on a three-episode hidden-camera series the platform launched earlier with internet personality Tana Mongeau, called “CringeMaxxing.”
DoorDash says more than 4 million customers ordered awkward essentials through the app between April 2025 and April 2026, including a condom sold every 37 seconds.
Batalon’s casting isn’t happening in isolation. Sony Pictures beat DoorDash to the joke back in June, running a mock TED Talk titled “A message from Founder & CEO, Ned Leeds” to promote a Samsung-built fan site.
That followed two other Batalon brand tie-ins this summer: a Liquid I.V. commercial built around Ned’s “No Way Home” memory-wipe storyline, and a Samsung Galaxy ambassador deal tied to “Spider-Man: Brand New Day.”
DoorDash, meanwhile, has its own recent taste for star power, having just wrapped its first global campaign featuring Ricardo Kaká, Alex Morgan, and Khaby Lame ahead of the FIFA World Cup.
For Batalon, playing a meme-turned-mascot is a low-lift way to cash in on internet fame he never asked for. For DoorDash, it’s a bet that a familiar face can keep an already-viral storefront concept feeling fresh.
Takeaways
DoorDash isn’t just casting a funny face here; it’s monetizing an internet artifact. The “CEO of Sex” meme already came with years of built-in recognition, letting DoorDash skip the slow work of building a mascot from scratch.
It’s also worth noting how busy a year this has been for Batalon specifically: hydration, tech, and now food delivery, all riding the same joke and the same movie moment. That’s an unusual amount of brand real estate for an actor best known as the sidekick, not the lead.
Does leaning on a six-year-old meme guarantee longer engagement, or does it risk feeling stale once the novelty wears off? Could CringeMart’s mix of pranks and celebrity casting become a template other delivery apps try to copy?
