Cause Marketing

AutoZone, the car parts dealer with more than 4500 stores across the United States is headquartered in Memphis Tennessee. So too is St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Not surprisingly AutoZone is a cause marketing supporter of St. Jude. Fedex, another Memphis-based company sponsors the St. Jude Classic, a PGA Tour event held each year at the TPC Southwind golf course, also in Memphis. It isn’t always the case that cause marketing tie-ins take place between companies and causes in the same area code. For instance, another of St Jude’s sponsors is Target, headquartered 700 miles upriver in Minneapolis, Minnesota. But if you’re a cause looking to start a cause marketing relationship a logical place to look for cause marketing sponsors is in your own backyard. Here’s five reasons why: The prospect is more likely to take your call. Locality improves the chance that the sponsor will respond. You probably already know someone there or can more easily make a connection than if the prospe...

We’ve discussed a T-shirt cause marketing by social enterprises in the past with outfits like Rosa Loves . But most of those efforts were based on e-commerce business models. Now there’s a new social enterprise that includes bricks and mortar retailers as part of its business model. Called Giving Tee , here’s how it works: Retailers sell Giving Tee T-shirt designs in their stores for $20. When customers enter a code on the hangtag of the Tee it triggers a donation to one of Giving Tee’s featured causes. There are currently 24 charities listed on Giving Tee’s website, including Habitat for Humanity , The Humane Society , Amnesty International , the Red Cross , Make-A-Wish , and the Wear Good for Haiti Initiative. The designs for Wear Good for Haiti are the only Tees Giving Tee currently sells on its website. The revenue split is as follows: The cause gets $5, the retailer gets $5, the designer (Giving Tee crowd-sources the designs) gets $1, and Giving Tee gets the remainder. After costs...

It's not often that I get to 'break' news here at the Cause-Related Marketing blog, but today I do. Here's a press release, leaked to me, which announces that The Humane Society of the United States is the tenth charity to benefit from Windows Live Messenger's cause-marketing campaign called the i'm Initiative . The Humane Society of the United States Announces Participation in the i’m Initiative from Microsoft Windows Live Messenger connects customers to top social causes through the donation of Microsoft advertising dollars (May 21, 2007) - Starting today, anyone who sends instant messages to their friends, family or colleagues using Windows Live Messenger can also help animals at the same time. Through participation in the i’m Initiative from Microsoft, The Humane Society of the United States is offering supporters and other animal lovers who download Windows Live Messenger the opportunity to make a difference without spending a dime. Microsoft will donate a ...