Cause Marketing by the Bag

When I was in nonprofit management I heard a lot of pitches from retailers or suppliers wanting to sell something to my list of supporters. But there was always a sticking point. Oftentimes they wanted me to just turn over my donor list. That was a nonstarter. Later they wanted to put my logo on their merchandise or sales platform, usually without any upfront money. Those terms, too, were unacceptable.

Now a West Coast coffee roaster called Newhall Coffee Roasting Company offers an approach and terms that I think a lot of nonprofit managers could swallow.

Sell fresh-roasted coffee with your nonprofit branding on it and you get to keep a “significant percentage of the proceeds.”

Called Newhall Coffee for a Cause, all sales take place on a customizable webpage and Newhall handles all fulfillment and returns. Marketing materials like fliers, brochures and postcards are also available to participants.

Very few would-be partners get this part right. The biggest 500 nonprofit charities in United States all have their own marketing departments and webmasters. Every other charity… a number which is in the tens of thousands… doesn't have the same resources.

Good for Newhall for making this so easy for charities.

All that said, I have reservations about Newhall Coffee for a Cause.

• Any proceeds are going to a taxable to most nonprofit charities.
• Suppose Newhall inadvertently introduces some substance or chemical into the beans sold in my branded bag that is subsequently found to be a carcinogen, whose liability is that?
• The quarterly payment is probably fine for the largest nonprofits, but for smaller ones it’s a burden.
• The “significant percentage of the proceeds” is too vague and not helpful.
• Are there any minimums?
• How much customization does Newhall permit in packaging and branding materials?
  

Probably some of these questions are addressed in the agreement nonprofits sign with Newhall, but it wasn’t visible on the webpages I could read.

(The photo illustration comes from Springwise.com).

Using Buy One, Give One in Cause Marketing, #3

The grand-daddy of all buy one, give one (BOGO) cause marketing is TOMS Shoes, which I've profiled in the past. TOMS gives away a pair of its alpargatas-style shoes when your buy a pair. TOMS has never advertised heavily, but so great was the buzz that TOMS generated that its founder, Blake Mycoskie, was featured in TV ad on the left for AT&T.

I've also profiled BOGO efforts from HUGO Fragrances, Pampers, LJ Urban which built a house in Burkina Faso when you bought one of their homes in Sacramento, a solar charger called Solio that provided a match for a soldier serving abroad when you bought another.

On April 1, 2009, I even ran a post saying that India's Tata Motors was doing a BOGO for their $2,500 Nano car. It was an April Fool's Day joke that no one ever called me on. I now confess now that I made up the whole thing.

These next BOGOs, however, are no joke.

1. Buy a men’s tie, either a necktie or bowtie, from Figs and they’ll send a school uniform to a schoolchild in east Africa. They call it ‘Threads for Threads.’
2. CellarThief.com donates 100 days of clean water for one person for every bottle of wine you buy. The mechanism for how the water donation takes place or where its given is not specified.
3. Give a Day Get a Disney Day encouraged volunteerism by giving a day at a Disney theme park when you volunteered for a day.
4. Sage Hospitality, a Denver company that owns and manages hotel properties in North America, ran a similar effort meant to encourage volunteerism called 'Give a Day, Get a Night.' (Sorry, but the link is no longer active.)

Cause Marketing With Buy One Give One, #2

Today’s post describes three BOGO (buy one, give one) cause marketing campaigns from outside the United States. Read yesterday's post on BOGO here.

Included in this list is 'Plus One' from Darford International, a dog food manufacturer in British Columbia, Canada, which is the most brilliant example of BOGO cause marketing I’ve ever seen so far. It's well named, well thought-out, and, I think, likely to improve Darford's long-term sales prospects.

The wonderfully-named Baby Teresa, based in Tasmania, Australia, offers BOGO onesies. Baby Teresa also takes applications to join them when they distribute the onesies in developing world countries.

B1G1 is a kind of giving society based in Singapore that enables companies to do transactional cause marketing without a bunch of set up or hassle. Among its offerings is a business card that offers a $1 donation to the charity of choice for the person who redeems it.

Plus One, from Darford International in British Columbia, Canada, is a feeding campaign for rescued dogs in Canada and the United States. Attached to the top of each box of Darford dog food and Darford dog treats is a single-meal packet. Detach the packet and deposit it into Plus One hamper located near the dog food aisle. Local dog rescue efforts periodically pick up the food at the retailers.

When you close on a mortgage through ING in Netherlands and make a donation to help people in developing countries buy their own homes, the company will match your donation up to €300.

Tomorrow, more stateside BOGO cause marketing.

Cause Marketing Via Buy One, Give One, #1

'Buy one, give one' (BOGO) has been around for a couple years now and the cause marketing practice is still growing dramatically. It's not for everyone, but for those that can pull it off BOGO generates mad publicity and word-of-mouth.

BOGO means that when you buy one of something, another one is given away to a needy party. A variation is when you buy one thing and it triggers the donation of second, but different item.

For the next three days I’m going to list and briefly describe all the BOGO I’ve seen. No doubt I’ll miss some so I hope you, my faithful readers, will add to the list.

Please email me BOGO examples at aldenkeene @ gmail . com, or use the comments below.

• Buy a Cricut Expression or YUDU machine at Michaels crafts store and the retailer will give a Cricut or YUDU machine to the school of your choice. The Cricut is a home machine cutter and the YUDU is a home silk screen machine. Both are made by Provo Craft.
• When you buy a photo printed on canvas and mounted, called a ‘gallery wrap,’ Picture it on Canvas gives a $35 gift certificate to an unspecified charity.
• Whitten Grey gives a little girl’s dress to a girl in a developing country when you purchase one of their organic cotton dresses. The purchase generates a code. You go to the Whitten Grey website, enter the code and designate the country where the BOGO dress will go. You can even include a note with the dress.
• Happy Blankie, founded by pre-teen David Holdridge and his mother Emily gives a free animal shaped blankie to a child in one of five places... Thailand, Uganda, and three locations in the United States... when you buy one. Buyers get to designate where the BOGO blankie goes.
• Warby Parker sells classically style prescription eyeglass for men and women for $95. In conjunction with charities including Restoring Vision. The BOGO pair of glasses go to needy people in Latin America, Africa and South Asia, 24 countries so far.

Tomorrow: BOGO from outside the United States, including the most impressive effort I've seen so far.

How Strong is the Appeal of Your Cause?

It’s gut-check time my charity friends. How strong is the appeal of your cause?

1. Could you call a major donor to secure the funding to take advantage of a great advertising opportunity that falls into your lap last minute?
2. Could you rally your fans to support your entry in the American Express Members Project?
3. Is your fundraising still doing fine, even in the Great Recession?
4. Could you get competitors to sponsor your event?

I saw the double-truck ad to the left in the July issue of Spirit magazine, the in-flight magazine of Southwest Airlines. For 11 years Southwest has sponsored the Phoenix Luv Classic, a benefit golf tourney for the Ronald McDonald Houses.

This year the tournament raised more than $300,000, the ad reports.

But for me the news isn’t the dollar amount, which is respectable given the economy. Instead the story is the list of sponsors.

That list includes direct competitors with Southwest, including Virgin Atlantic, and JetBlue, and indirect competitors Aer Lingus, AeroMexico, Air Pacific, Cathay Pacific, Korean Air, Luftansa, Philippine Airlines and South African Airways.

Note also that competing beermakers Bud Light, MillerCoors and Heineken are also sponsors.

I can imagine how this happened. Maybe Southwest’s tournament committee is just super-well connected. Maybe they twisted arms or shamed their competitors. Maybe the commitment of the various competitors was actually pretty low. Maybe after 11 years the Phoenix Luv Classic just has a ton of momentum behind it.

No matter, it couldn’t have happened if the Ronald McDonald Houses weren’t so well known or respected.

Cause Marketing Older than Your Grandfather

Years ago I worked with the American Legion and I heard a side of the story about the development of the groundbreaking GI Bill that's not commonly known. Namely, that the American Legion that had agitated and lobbied for the bill and Harry Walter Colmery, a lawyer and former American Legion National Commander, drafted it. President Roosevelt signed the bill into law on June 22, 1944.

Now thanks to a timely email from Laurie Shaffer of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, I’ve learned about a campaign that has generated more than $750 million since 1934 and thereby helped preserve some 5.3 million acres of waterfowl habitat in the United States.

The effort is called Federal Duck Stamps. Perhaps like me you’ve heard the name but aren’t familiar with its ins and outs. Here’s how it works:

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service produces an annual limited-edition illustrated stamp, similar to a postage stamp, although it can’t be used as postage. The price for 2010 edition is $15. A healthy secondary market in former stamps has developed over the years. Prominent wildlife artists vie to illustrate the stamp.

The money is used by the Service to purchase or lease important waterfowl habitat.

Now a new envelope and stamp set, called a silk cachet, has been released for $25. The extra funds will be used to augment the acreage of more than 38 National Wildlife Refuges along the Gulf Coast.

The first edition of the silk cachet was underwritten by Bass Pro Shops, a big-box retailer and outfitter. The silk cachet was unveiled at the Ducks Unlimited headquarters on July 27 in Memphis at a ceremony featuring the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar.

Badly Illustrated Cause Marketing

Look at the illustration on the left. Now read the copy. Now back to the illustration. Now read the copy. Sadly, the illustration doesn't really illustrate the copy, does it?

I'm not a graphic designer or an art director. So I'm at a loss to explain the graphic design for a cause marketing campaign that was being promoted with table toppers at a Corner Bakery in Denver last week.

Here's the campaign: When you buy a BBLT or a Chilled Berry Almond Swiss Oatmeal at Corner Bakery, they'll donate a "portion of the proceeds" to community gardens in the form of a grant.

There's just such a garden about a block and half from where I saw this table topper, although I don't know if it's targeted to receive a Corner Bakery grant or not.

I guess I sorta get the tomato plant changing hands. Although why you'd transplant it with a green tomato on I can't imagine.

But where's the illustration of the BBLT and the Chilled Berry Almond Swiss Oatmeal? You know, the purchase of which triggers the donation. You literally have to read all the copy in order to get gist of the campaign. The art direction of this piece provides zero help.

And since it's a table topper I'm unlikely to order either product based on seeing it since if I'm sitting down at a table at a Corner Bakery that means I've already ordered my meal at the front counter.

Maybe you're thinking the pictures of the BBLT and the Chilled Berry Almond Swiss Oatmeal are on the other side of the table topper.

Good thinking, but no.

Instead the other side refers to the BBLT and the Chilled Berry Almond Swiss Oatmeal, but shows two wire baskets. One has apples, lemons and basil. The other has tomatoes, garlic, and basil.

My friends, advertising your transactional cause marketing campaigns isn't rocket science. Show the products that trigger the donation, show the benefits and explain how the campaign works.