Ladies AND gentlemen, put on your dresses! The Saints are headed to the Super Bowl!

For millions of Americans, the Super Bowl is a national holiday. They attend big parties, cook lavish dinners, and get together with family and friends they haven’t seen in a while.

But dress in drag and parade down Bourbon Street? Probably not.

Yet that’s just what former Saints quarterback, Bobby Hebert, did last Sunday during the 2010 Super Bowl Parade in New Orleans.

Beloved Big Easy sportscaster, Buddy Diliberto, promised years ago to all Saints fans everywhere that he would walk down Bourbon Street dressed in drag should the Saints finally make it to the Super Bowl. When Diliberto passed away in 2005, Hebert took over the sportscaster’s long-running radio show as well as his promise to don a dress.

And when the Saints beat the Minnesota Vikings in the NFC Championship two weeks ago, Bobby Hebert found himself with a bet to settle. And settle it he did, sashaying from the Superdome all the way to the French Quarter on Sunday in a blonde pig-tailed wig, a sparkling muu muu, and – yes, that’s a tiny tiara. The muu muu was a gold and black sequined ensemble made especially for the parade by Hebert’s 23-year-old daughter, Cammy Lynn, who described the dress as “very Who-Dat-esque.”

But what makes this a notable use of PR is that it comes with a twist. In my opinion, the best PR stunts don’t just happily surprise the target audience but also the “stuntmen” themselves. When Hebert announced his upcoming appearance in the Mardi Gras Parade, hundreds of men volunteered to join the quarterback in his cross-dressed caper through New Orleans. The streets were so crowded that Hebert couldn’t walk – he had to be placed on a float to make it through the parade.

“This parade [was] totally out of control. It was above and beyond anything I expected,” Hebert told the New York Daily News. “We had men calling the station and wanting to form a club to march in all these Mardi Gras parades. I said, ‘Wait a minute, I just said I would do this one time.’”

This is a good PR tactic gone great – what started as a good-hearted tribute to a beloved radio host (and a little free publicity for Hebert and his show) turned into an massive, over-the-top display of unity and camaraderie for all New Orleans citizens and all Saints fans everywhere.

And if that’s not good PR, I don’t know what is.

Check out the gallery below for pictures of Bobby Hebert before and after the infamous muu muu as well as one of the late great Buddy Diliberto.

Courtesy nydailynews.com

Courtesy nydailynews.com

Courtesy nydailynews.com

Courtesy buddysbroads.com