As Seen on TV Cause Marketing

One of the pretenses of reality TV in the United States is doing whatever you do in the name of charity. It seems like half the bikes built on the show American Chopper, for instance, are made to be donated to or otherwise auctioned off on behalf of charity.

Likewise, basically every episode of The Celebrity Apprentice turns on one kind of charity fundraiser or another.

It sorta has to be that way. The Donald really doesn’t want to turn loose on his empire a bunch of half-competent 20-watt celebrities.

Before Arsenio Hall’s win on The Celebrity Apprentice May 20, 2012, Walgreens, the mega drugstore chain, developed and began selling a bracelet for $3, with $2 of that going to the Magic Johnson Foundation. The Foundation also received $250,000 thanks to Hall’s Apprentice win.

The card that holds the bracelet says that Walgreens was “inspired by Arsenio Hall’s work to support the Magic Johnson Foundation and created this bracelet to symbolize our joint commitment.” Walgreens had the bracelet in store before Hall’s win on live TV, so they didn’t start the campaign knowing how well he’d finish. (Unless, of course, 'the fix was in.')

But it’s evident that Walgreens may have moved faster than it could internally support the effort.

For instance, Arsenio’s promotional video for the bracelet directs you to walgreens.com/walk, which is Walgreens’ site that incentivizes customers to be physically active. The card above directs you to Walgreens.com/waytowell, which is Walgreens corporate responsibility site.

The waytowell site had a prominent placement of logos from the American Diabetes Association, American Heart Association, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, American Cancer Society and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. But no Magic Johnson. Not even a site search turned up any mention of the Magic Johnson Foundation.

Walgreens.com/walk, however, did turn up multiple mentions of the Magic Johnson Foundation.

Go figure.

Still, I got nothing but love for this effort and here's why:

Walgreens is a $73 billion (sales) company. We usually say that companies that big are flat-footed and slow to act. But not in this cause marketing promotion.

Kudos to Walgreens its Magic Johnson-like nimbleness.

Comments

Chili’s and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital

I was in Chili’s today and I ordered their “Triple-Dipper,” a three appetizer combo. While I waited for the food, I noticed another kind of combo. Chili’s is doing a full-featured cause-related marketing campaign for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. There was a four-sided laminated table tent outlining the campaign on the table. When the waitress brought the drinks she slapped down Chili’s trademark square paper beverage coasters and on them was a call to action for an element of the campaign called ‘Create-A-Pepper,’ a kind of paper icon campaign. The wait staff was all attired in black shirts co-branded with Chili’s and St. Jude. The Create-A-Pepper paper icon could be found in a stack behind the hostess area. The Peppers are outlines of Chili’s iconic logo meant to be colored. I paid $1 for mine, but they would have taken $5, $10, or more. The crayons, too, were co-branded with the ‘Create-A-Pepper’ and St. Jude’s logos. There’s also creatapepper.com, a microsite, but again wi...

Part 2: How Chili's Used Cause-Related Marketing to Raise $8.2 million for St. Jude

[Bloggers Note: In this second half of this post I discuss the nuts and bolts of how Chili's motivates support from its employees and managers and how St. Jude 'activates' support from Chili's. Read the first half here.] How does St. Jude motivate support from Chili’s front line employees and management alike? They call it ‘activation’ and they do so by the following: They share stories of St. Jude patients who were sick and got better thanks to the services they received at the hospital. Two stories in particular are personal for Chili’s staff. A Chili’s bartender in El Dorado Hills, California named Jeff Eagles has a younger brother who was treated at St. Jude. In both 2005 and 2006 Eagles was the campaign’s biggest individual fundraiser. John Griffin, a manager at the Chili’s in Conway, Arkansas had an infant daughter who was treated for retinoblastoma at St. Jude. They drew on the support Doug Brooks… the president and CEO of Brinker International, Chili’s parent co...

A Clever Cause Marketing Campaign from Snickers and Feeding America

Back in August I bought this cause-marketed Snickers bar during my fourth trip of the day to Home Depot. (Is it even possible to do home repairs and take care of all your needs with just one trip to Home Depot / Lowes ?) Here’s how it works: Snickers is donating the cost of 2.5 million meals to Feeding America, the nation’s leading hunger-relief charity. On the inside of the wrapper is a code. Text that code to 45495… or enter it at snickers.com… and Snickers will donate the cost of one meal to Feeding America, up to one million additional meals. The Feeding America website says that each dollar you donate provides seven meals. So Snickers donation might be something like $500,000. But I like that Snickers quantified its donations in terms of meals made available, rather than dollars. That’s much more concrete. It doesn’t hurt that 3.5 million is a much bigger number than $500,000. I also like the way they structured the donation. By guaranteeing 2.5 million meals, the risk of a poor...

Cause Marketing

Search This Blog