Cause Marketing

In the immediate aftermath of Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s silly public missteps with Planned Parenthood (and KFC before that), a lot of pundits read the tea leaves and foresaw corporate defections from Komen’s sponsor list and public excoriation. So much for all that. On April 5, 2012 Komen and Caribou Coffee announced a deal whereby Komen would be the beneficiary of Amy’s Blend , a coffee blend names for former Caribou roastmaster Amy Erickson, who succumbed to breast cancer after a lengthy battle. Komen is also the partner in Amy’s Gardens, three gardens that celebrate Erickson’s valiant fight. With 450 stores, Caribou is the second-largest coffee house chain in the United States, after the much, much larger Starbucks. Caribou inked the deal despite the fact that there are anti-Komen websites, scholars whose careers hinge on being anti-Komen, an anti-Komen documentary movie, and a half-dozen of so direct competitors. Komen absorbs the blows from all these brickbats and more and ke...

J.C. Penney announced yesterday a campaign whereby they will ask customers to round-up their change to the nearest dollar and send the money to the retailer’s long-standing efforts on behalf of afterschool programs. The campaign is called ‘ Pennies From Heaven ’ and the goal is to generate 100 million pennies, or $1 million. Pennies is also selling a limited-edition change purse for $9.99 designed by Mark-Kate and Ashley Olsen, the twin sisters who were once primarily actors and now are primarily a brand. There’s also a Facebook component, a ringtone, and promotions with Foursquare and Twitter. As of this writing, the penny counter at http://jcpenneyafterschool.org/ says they’ve generated 130,711,075 pennies. J.C. Penney’s Afterschool Program primarily benefits The Boys and Girls Club of America, the Y, the United Way, FIRST, a science and technology nonprofit, and my old friends at 4-H. So how do I take credit for any of this? My post on March 25, 2008 was called, no kidding, ‘Penn...

The other day a new friend asked, “Is there such a thing as cause marketing targeted at children?” Of course cause marketing to kids would be a conundrum. While 4 to12-year-olds influence at least $128 billion in household spending , perhaps 5 percent of that total is money kids can actually spend on their own. And influence is a fuzzy notion. In my household, for instance, my kids have never influenced me to buy the sugary cereals whose ads run in hot rotation on Nick Jr. , although I might ask them whether they prefer Oreos or Pepperidge Farm cookies. But I couldn’t think of any cause marketing targeted at children so I promised to consult Alden Keene’s voluminous database of cause marketing ads . I was slightly surprised to find the example above, which comes from the September 2007 SI Kids magazine . Above is the third page of a three-page ad for retailer JC Penney. The first two pages are in a double-truck configuration and feature NFL player and all-around good guy Michael Strah...

GamesThatGive.net allows you to play common video games like Solitaire, Sudoku, and Blackjack for free, while making a sliver of a donation to one of 13 nonprofit charities. Here's how it works. Behind each of the games a static advertisement runs for sponsors like Domino's Pizza, Dial, Pepsi or others. GamesThatGive.net donates 70 percent of ad revenue to those charities, including the United Way, UNICEF, and the Wilderness Society. As of this writing on Sept. 22, 2009, the donations counter at the top of the home page read: "GamesThatGive has donated $2032.13 to charity." I put a handful of questions to Brian Reich, GamesThatGive's principal evangelist, about where the idea came from, how it works, and how it's been received by charities and sponsors. His responses follow. How did the idea come about for GamesthatGive.net? The idea came, mostly, from the experiences of our CEO, Adam Archer. He traveled the world a few years back and upon his return to th...

In a sales circular that landed in my mailbox on Monday, Dec. 8, Wal-Mart gave three-quarters of a page to the venerable Salvation Army. Too bad it couldn’t have been much less useful. In 45 swift words the page mentions that need will be great this year, that the Salvation Army will again provide a backstop for the nation’s neediest and that Wal-Mart encourages support of this worthy cause this season, all in a much too-short, unhelpful ad. MIA is any call to action, like ‘support the bell-ringers with your donations.’ Or, go online to make a donation to the Sally Ann’s virtual red kettle . In this ad, the Salvation Army comes off like a Christmastime charity, as though it was just Toys for Tots for adults or families. Where’s mention of the Salvation Army’s 100-year history (in the States) of extraordinary work on behalf of the poor, the destitute, and the dispossessed? Wal-Mart and the Salvation Army have been together for more than two decades, where’s a real sense of partnership i...

The Entertainment Industry Foundation , a federated charity founded in 1942 by Samuel Goldwyn, Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, and the Warner Brothers, has always held a wonderful fascination for me. Nowadays you’re likely to know about the EIF because of the National Colorectal Cancer Research Alliance, co-founded by Katie Couric after the death of her husband Jay Monahan to colorectal cancer, and administered under the auspices of the Foundation. But EIF’s other major initiatives include their Women’s Cancer Programs, National Arts and Education Initiative, and Diabetes Aware. But IEF also has a number of other minor initiatives as well as donor-advised funds supervised by such luminaries as rockers the Blackeyed Peas, former Bondman Pierce Brosnan, the Animal Actors Guild (I can only assume Lassie barks her orders at board meetings), American Idol softy Randy Jackson, and others. Their mission statement goes like this: “The Entertainment Industry Foundation, as the leading charitable...

Not Exactly Golden Locks How do you target Gen Y, the 76 million [in the States] ‘Millennials’ born between 1978 and 2000? Well a cause campaign is not a bad idea because the members of Gen Y are characterized as idealistic, optimistic, honest and sincere. And they like to shop. Few of them remember the time before the Internet and they’re the most technologically savvy generation ever. We used to say they were the most wired generation, but that’s no longer true; if I have any Gen Y readers they’re probably reading this on their cell phones. But what kind of cause appeals to them? United Way is for people who drive Buicks. Susan G. Komen is for the mothers and grandmothers of Gen Y. Make-A-Wish ? You’re getting warmer. Finesse hair shampoo and conditioner picked Locks of Love , the Lake Worth, Florida nonprofit that solicits donations of natural hair which is then manufactured into wigs and distributed to kids and adults with long-term hair loss, usually due to a condition called al...