The Funniest Part of the ‘White Lotus’ Finale Is How It Screwed Over Its Corporate Partner

Warning: This article contains spoilers for season three of The White Lotus, as well as descriptions of self-harm. 

The third season finale of The White Lotus sure seemed to piss a lot of people off. 

Viewers have expressed annoyance that some of the most wheel-spinning plot threads didn’t amount amount to much by the end of the season, not to mention that several key characters made some truly baffling decisions, and much of the episode revolved around an over-the-top shoot-out that was precipitated by a goofy, Darth Vader-like misunderstanding.

But it may have all been worth it for this hilarious behind-the-scenes story involving one of the show’s corporate partners: Coffee Mate. 

It’s not unusual for major TV shows to have tie-ins with food products, like how Eggo waffles put Stranger Things’ Eleven on their boxes, and Mountain Dew released a Game of Thrones-themed can, which could be used for drinking or pummeling one’s enemies to a bloody pulp. 

For some reason, brands were apparently lining up to hitch their products to Mike White’s hit show about death, privilege and existential malaise-fueled self-destruction. One of these companies, Coffee Mate, worked with the show to release two new flavors of coffee creamers: Thai Iced Coffee and Piña Colada. 

When the partnership was announced back in December, the creamer brand bragged about how “fans can experience this season’s luxurious Thai vacation vibes with the simple click of a button and pour of a creamer,” adding that “nothing screams serenity quite like the sweet combination of coconut and tangy pineapple.”

While the cross-promotion may have initially seemed to have a very tenuous connection to The White Lotus, one of those new flavors actually did factor into the show itself — albeit in the worst possible way. In the finale, Jason Isaacs’ character Tim Ratliff — who secretly lost all his money, is facing jail time for fraud and spent most of the season zonked out on his wife’s lorazepam — decides to murder most of his family members and then take his own life. How? By making everybody a batch of Piña Coladas that have been spiked with seeds from the poisonous pong pong fruit.

It’s a very disturbing scene, that is, until Tim suddenly changes his mind and smacks the drink out of his son’s hand, claiming that the coconut milk has gone off. And for some reason, despite ingesting trace amounts of deadly poison, none of the Ratliffs gets so much as a tummy ache that night.

Per The Hollywood Reporter, Coffee Mate’s parent company Nestlé was totally kept in the dark about the events of the finale, and had no idea that their new flavor would come to be associated with an attempted murder-suicide. Although, to be honest, the company being closely associated with a morally bankrupt psychopath is arguably very fitting. 

Funnier still, according to the president of Nestlé USA’s coffee and beverage division, Daniel Jhung, the White Lotus people were presented with a number of different flavors that could potentially be used in the cross-promotion, and they jumped at the chance to secretly reference the grisly scene. “The White Lotus team was like, ‘Oh, you know, piña colada is a really good idea, you should go in that direction’ — it now kind of makes sense,” Jhung revealed.

The company “didn’t know” that their product would become synonymous with literal poison until everyone watched the finale last Sunday night. The brand’s marketing team quickly tried to turn the “surprising” scene to their advantage, with an Instagram post about the “awkward” turn of events. 

The only way it could have been worse is if Mike White had somehow worked Coffee Mate into the brotherly jerk-off scene.