Kroger’s Giving Hope a Hand Campaign is Gaining Momentum

Kroger’s Giving Hope a Hand campaign, an anti-breast cancer effort is gaining momentum for much the same reasons that General Mills’ Boxtops for Education and Campbell’s Labels for Education have; it’s opened up the effort to other brands.

That is, Giving Hope a Hand… like Campbell’s Labels for Education and General Mills Boxtops for Education… has made the leap from its exclusive relationship with Kroger to including the participation of other brands, including Dannon’s Activa brand of yogurt, Freschetta pizza, Kraft cheese, Pepsi, Purina, Windex, and Ziploc, among others.

(Parenthetically, it’s interesting to note that other Dannon brands participate in Labels for Education. Ziploc also participates in Boxtops for Education! Kraft, of course, also does a prominent cause marketing effort on behalf of Feeding America).

At the left are the front and back panels of a box of Keebler’s Town House crackers that I saw in December 2011, but which certainly predated that time period. The Keebler brand is owned by Kellogg’s.

By following the lead of the ‘Boxtops’ and ‘Labels’ efforts, Kroger’s Giving Hope a Hand has done a valuable service for participating brands.

Freschetta, the freezer pizza brand from Schwan’s, can piggyback on the framework that Kroger has built. It could go as far as Keebler has with this box of Town House crackers, something less involving, or something in-between.

By building the framework Kroger, the only large grocery chain giant in the United States to successfully withstand the WalMart onslaught, spreads the risk of the Giving Hope a Hand and greatly broadens the potential reach of the campaign.

I last reviewed a Giving Hope a Hand effort in December 2010. That effort highlighted breast cancer survivor stories on packages of Kroger’s house brand of bottled water. I noted, approvingly, that it was one of the first examples of house brand cause marketing I’d seen.

Money raised by Giving Hope a Hand is currently directed to three breast cancer charities; Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer and Y Me.

Increasingly I’m coming to the conclusion that the greatest contribution a large company like Kroger can make in cause marketing isn’t a cash donation but rather building a framework that vendors, suppliers and other stakeholders can add to, while providing the charity with access to their customer base.

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