The Ben & Jerry's PR churning machine has certainly been in overdrive over the last few months with various announcements about carbon footprints, a fairtrade vanilla and an end to trivial stunts.
As one of the forefathers of authentic social responsibility Ben & Jerry's is certainly a brand that should always be listened too, especially as their skill has been not simply taking a worthy stance, but doing so in a way that sounds neither patronizing or sanctimonious.
Is it me or are the latest dispatches starting to sound a tad corporate, dare I say insincere! It's all very well having a fairtrade vanilla, but what about the other ten or so flavours that have been filling chiller caginets in the UK for 10+ years.
It seems strange that their opening gambit is the one flavour (vanilla) where Haagen Dazs has historically put them to the sword.
If genuinely sincere wouldn't we be talking about entire fairtrade portfolios, organic offerings, addressing airmiles (Vermont's a fair hike) or some more eco-friendly packaging.
I cringed when they started mimicking Innocent concerts (interestingly Innocent have now stopped) and am now getting a sinking feeling that its the publicity grabbing multinational in the background that is now pulling the PR strings, for a few hollow soundbites.
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1 comment:
Purple Pilchard... on the money. it was always a question of when? not if, the brand would succumb and be compromised by profit targets and a very demanding head office! Like the blog...
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