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Is it possible to turn two wrongs into a right?

Well, not a 'right', but a good thing nonethless.

Here we go...

Wrong 1 : The increasingly unsightly amount of discarded free-sheets cluttering up our transport system and streets.

Wrong  2 : Homelessness

Hats off to Canadian design company Taxi, who have designed a very durable, but cheap to produce jacket, that they are distribruting 3,000 of to the homeless in Canada. 

Here's the clever bit.  The jacklet has been designed with multiple pockets throughout with the lining which are designed to be packed with newsprint - a highly effective insulator.

 

To fund the production run, the company approached a series of diverse celebrities, including Michael Caine, REM, Heidi Klum and Nicholas Negroponte to sign the jackets, which were then auctioned on Ebay.

Why is it that the simplest ideas are always the best?

I have no idea whether anyone from Assocaited or News Int reads this blog, but if you do, first, welcome.  Second, you might want to get in touch with Taxi about getting the product into the UK.

For more details - just click here.

-- Toby

Create a dream job

As an antidote to recession and job fears is there a way for a brand you work on to take say £50-£100k of their marketing budget and use to it create a dream job for someone that's relevant to the brand? A model scout for a young male brand that's full of testosterone, a taster for a beer brand, someone to travel the world to find the world's best roads to drive on for a car brand that celebrates driving, or a band scout for a music brand (or a brand with music affiliations). Think of the (potentially global) PR and word of mouth the brand would get with the announcement and the quest for the right person. And part of their job role could include making content such as videos, blogs, updating social networking pages. It looks like Tourism Australia have done just that in their quest for a caretaker for Hamilton Island in the Whitsundays - where you'll find one of the best beaches in the world. There's more on it here. Nice and effective work.

Stephen

You can't beat the real thing

A quick follow up to the Branding for Good post of a few weeks ago.

Coca Cola's stated objective for its distribution strategy is, allegedly, that no one should ever be more than an arm's length from a Coke.  Ambitious, you might say, but then anyone who has travelled the world at all will know that they work pretty hard to make this as real as possible.

It's a formidable undertaking.  And now there's a brilliant idea to put this network to use above and beyond selling Coke.  Colalife is a campaign to get Coca Cola to use this distribution network to distribute basic medicines to hard to get to places.

It's a brilliantly simple idea - using an already existing businesss asset to potentially enormous social effect - exactly what CSR should be about.  Find out more here, or sign up to the  Facebook group - currently at 6,500 but, in my view, deserving of many more.

-- Toby

Heal the world, make it a Better Place

 

For all those at OMD currently coming up with ideas for the Trading Places initiative, I thought you might find this a little inspiring!

 

I came across a story, and dare I say it, a ‘big idea’, in Wired recently that intrigued me. The idea belongs to Shai Agassi. If you haven’t heard of him yet, you will soon.  His plan is ‘simple’, to save the planet. Now I know what you are thinking; Superman has already thought of that, so I will explain.  His idea is to put electric cars on the road and create a worldwide grid of charging stations that effectively replace petrol stations. In short, a whole new business model for the automobile industry.

 

Incredibly, his interest in energy is relatively new.  In 2005 he joined the ‘Young Global Leaders’, an invite only group of politicians and business people under 40.  In his first meeting their task was to come up with ideas that would 'help make the world a better place by 2020'.  More specifically, Agassi’s brief was the environment. 

His background is in electronics. He sold an electronics company that he set up with his father to SAP for $400m.  Following this, he was made SAP’s Head of Products.  However, once he was given the brief from the YGL he clearly became consumed by it. In his words “once you have a mission, you can’t go back to having a job”. He resigned from SAP and set up Better Place.  His ambition - to “end oil”. 

Now considering the companies and politics involved, you might be thinking his goal was a ‘stretch target’, but no.  To make his plan a reality, he and an ever growing legion of devotees have designed a grid system that allows cars to recharge and change their batteries at work, home, in exchange centres and more. 

 

 

The grid feeds back to a central system that monitors and charges people for the exact miles they accumulate.  A person that clocks up 15,000 miles a year would pay $3,000 at present, compared to $1,050 with Better Place.  The idea doesn’t just shift the environmental burden over to the electric utility though.  His plan is to pay a premium and only use energy made from renewable resources.  The idea doesn't just shift the environmental burden over to the electric utility.  His plan is to pay a premium and only use energy made from renewable resources. 

 

The remarkable thing is that, to the shock of car makers and oil companies, he is already winning not just people over, but countries.  Israel was the first to sign up.  His close connections there, coupled with the Governments unease over their reliance on oil imported from neighbouring countries, has given them the beta test Better Place needed.  It doesn't stop there though, he has since signed up Denmark, a country commited to increasing their energy efficiency. Car makers are naturally taking note.  After meeting Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan Renault, they signed up to deliver 100,000 Better Place vehicles by the end of 2011. 

 

You are probably thinking that the ultimate test will be the US.  The country has the highest per capita consumption of oil in the world after all, so when he first presented his vision in Washington, it is no surprise that most Senators declared it impossible. Undeterred by this Agassi targeted the island state of Hawaii.  They have since signed up and they now have the Mayor or LA and San Franciscio knocking on their door as well. 

 

Clearly the guy must have remarkable energy and unbelievable ability to convey his vision.  That said, the interesting point made is that it is moving ahead not because of his selling alone, but because he is tapping in to something people now want.  In his words, Better place is "here to serve you, not to sell to you". 

 

As the aritcle concludes (click here to read it all), while he has only one prototype car, no charging stations yet, and not a single customer to date, everyone he meets is coming on board, arms held out, or cash in hand.  They believe they can see the future. 

 

Lets just hope Lex Luther isn't his apprentice.

 

- Sam

 

 

 

Branding for good

Sorry for not posting for a bit.  Things have been a little busy.  Still, back now, and thought I'd better finish off a post I started a few weeks ago but never got around to posting.  Apologies if you know all about it already.

We take as our start point an interview with Sir Martin S.  And you can bet that when Sir Martin Sorrell stands up and says something's important, a lot of people listen.  And he thinks it's important that advertising and marketing take responsibility for wider social and environmental issues :

'Consumers, governments and non-government organisations will favour those companies that take a more constructive approach to issues such as the environment, food availability, obesity and water shortages'

Here's the full interview, if you're interested.  We also assume this was the reasoning behind his selling of Robert Mugabe's agency of record in Zimbabwe.

There can be no denying that CSR has moved up the agenda recently.  Organisations are adopting 'causes' as fast as you like to show how committed they are to saving the planet, our kids etc etc.  Not only that, but as reported last week, government ad spend has topped £150m.

Now, in my opinion, all this is to be applauded.  As an industry we talk about how good we are at influencing people, so it's positive that we're deploying these skills to help solve bigger problems.  Just as long as the role of advertising and communication is kept in perspective - it's as foolish to believe that we can cure society's ills as it is to believe that simply banning (or 'restricting') our activity will fix the problem.

That all said, I thought I'd give you some of my favourite examples, along with a couple of lessons that we can learn from them.

We'll kick off with one you probably know about, Anomaly's campaign for Keep A Child Alive.  This was a campaign that hijacked the launch of the iphone in the US.  Basically one of the guys from Anomaly started queining up for the iPhone, safe in the knowledge that it was going to get loads of publicity.  They were right.  Soon he was getting interviewed by the news stations and he explained that he was going to buy the first iPhone in the US, and then immediately auction it on ebay for the charity.  The rest is, as they say, history.  Spike Lee came down to lend his support.  The phone sold for $100,000 and the media value of the coverage gained was in the millions:

In a similar vein is The Tap Project, created by Droga 5.  Another brilliantly simple idea which involved getting restaurants in cities across the US (it started in NY), to serve tap, instead of mineral, water for a day.  All the money raised went to providing clean drinking water to Africa.

Closer to home, we've a few examples, mainly in the form of what we would call 'Branded Content'.  Our colleagues over at MG have done some fantastic stuff PCSO TV show, which did so well at the Awards last year.  Jamie's School Dinners is another great example.  The lesson here seems to be that you must entertain as well as educate.  This is obviously easier as programming rather than advertising, as you have more time to both frame the problem and offer solutions.

This approach is also taking off abroad.  A new soap opera, Kyunki..Jeeni Isi Ka Naam Hai, lauched in India in April.  Woven into the storylines are advice about sanitation, HIV/AIDS and immunisation.  The idea was devleoped by Naysan Sahba whilst he was working on UNICEF's polio vaccination programme, and UN experts are used as script consultatnts.  More details are here if you're interested.

In Russia a radio soap, Dom 7, Podyezd 4, was set up to help ease the transition from Communist to capitalist society.  Remarkably, it even featured an appearance from then UK PM, Tony Blair.

Even more remarkably, the model for all of this is The Archers, the longest running soap in the UK, which has been broadcast on Radio 4 for 58 years.  It was originally created by the BBC in partnership with The Ministry of Agriculture, who were keen to disseminate information to increase agricultural productivity in the years following the end of rationing.

So, what lessons should we draw on from all of this?  I'd suggest four :

1.  Don't try and do it all on your own.  Putting consortia together to tackle these issues shares responsibility, resource and expertise.  This is something we know about as an agency.  It is easier than ever before to contact influential stakeholders and communities and pull in their support.  Jamie's School Dinners was a great example of this in action, where local networks were brought into the scheme, which could then be rolled up, through the power of Jamie and Channel 4 into a ntaional campaign.  Which brings me to the next point...

2.  Have a launch platform.  An event that pushes the issue into the national consciousness.  This is obviously hugely important, but don't let it take over, because...

3.  Don't, whatever you do, think that after the launch you've done it.  This was the problem Make Poverty History had.  After Live8 the campaign just vanished.  It's at this stage you have to go back to your partners and keep them interested and pushing forward.  Be clear about how you do this.

4.  And finally, remember that the best way of educating people is to entertain them as well.

All this is interesting stuff to be sure.  If you want to read more, I'd suggest looking at this.  It's the Movement Action Plan developed by Bill Moyer, a veteran social activist from the US, who worked with, amongst others, the Civil Rights movement, the American Indian Movement and the nuclear blockade at Seabrook.  A man who knows his stuff.  And who we could learn from.

-- Toby

Argumentum ad Hitlerum

Us smokers are used to 'shock tactics' to 'raise awareness' of the dangers of of our habit ("What? These are bad for me?  I thought they were full of vitamins and stuff"), but this campaign from Brazil, via Contagious, sets the bar pretty high :

An anti-smoking campaign by F/Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi in Sao Paulo brings new meaning to the maxim the medium is the message. A one-minute film recreates images of war - like tanks and bombs dropping from aircraft - to drive home the message that ‘smoking kills more’. The message is echoed in print ads where images of Adolf Hitler and Osama Bin Laden are made from cigarettes. A street art element – where passersby gape as 13,000 cigarettes transform into an image of Hitler before their eyes - has also been uploaded onto Flickr. Brazilian insurance company Unimed funded the campaign

Quite apart from the question of what next for anti-smoking campaigns, it's clear that the agency responsible haven't heard of the logical fallacy known as the argumentum ad Hitlerum.  A phrase first coined by the ethicist Leo Strauss in 1950, a explanation of which can be found here.

The fallacy is easy to spot, and has a pretty clear conclusion :  In any given debate, the first person to compare their opponent's position to that of Hitler or the Nazis has, in all likelihood, lost the argument.

Off for a ciggie now.

-- Toby

Losing His Virginity

I went to sit in the crowd at the London Business Forum interview with Richard Branson last week and thought I would share some insights gained from the experience.  Love him or hate him (few in the latter I imagine), the interview was enjoyable.  It was one of those expensive experiences that don't leave you with all the answers to business, but do leave you enthused.

Q - How have you managed to keep a 'challenger culture'?

A - By empowering people.  He spoke of when they first started the company and it grew to around 100 people.  At that point he believed that it was getting too big, so they split the company in two and established separate offices for each, with a new MD etc.  They have kept doing this ever since, keeping the challenger 'David versus Goliath' culture alive and empowering people in the process.   

Q - Do you write and respond to emails yourself?

A - Branson clearly didn't 'get didge'.  You couldn't even call him a digital immigrant, for he'd had his first computer lesson the week before the interview and openly stated that he didn't send or read emails himself.

Q - Where does he focus his attention these days?

A - 60% social issues and 40% business. 

Q - Three things he felt keep people motivated and enthused?

A - Responsibility, passion for what you believe in and parties

Q - What do you want to do when you retire?

A - His immediate response was that he never wanted to retire.  He said that he did not want to waste his privileged position.  He wanted to spend his time doing all he could to try and make a difference.

Q - What is a business?

A - He spoke of the preoccupation business people have with balance sheets, profit and loss.  He said that he still didn't understand the difference between net and gross and stated his belief that a companies prime role was not about making money.  Business was about the act of creation. It was about passionately believing in something and then trying to do it better than others.  Profit was just the by product that helps you try new projects.

Q - What are his key strengths as a manager?

A - He liked to think of himself as a people person and a good listener.  He spoke of always looking for the best in people, never the worst, stating that too many managers spend their time waiting for people to slip up.   A positive culture is one that lets people realise their own mistakes, rather than highlighting them.

Q - What makes a new project interesting to you?

A - If it immediately excites him, it is being done poorly at the moment, and if it sounds like fun

Q - Is Virgin in danger of stretching the brand too far?

A - 'Every time I have started a new venture we have been told we have gone too far'. 

Q - How have you kept growing through down turns?

A - He felt that a down turn was an opportunity.  If you sat back you made the doom a self fulfilling prophecy.  His belief was that you need to keep investing and expanding.

Q - When will you be offering the public trips to outer space?

A - In three years time, once he and his family have gone up on the first flight.

Aside from the above, the thing that stuck out was just how laid back and likeable he is.  Clearly he is a people person who cares passionately about both his company and wider social issues.  Cynics will have wanted to catch him out in some way, but small points like him coyly answering his mobile phone in front of a crowd of 500 business people would have frustrated them.  He could have rejected the call, but didn't, he answered it and spoke to the person asking if he could call back.

If the above is all a little too sickening for you, then you won't like his response to the final question either..

Q - So thank you Richard, your time had been much appreciated by all.  One final question we thought would be entertaining - you are sitting opposite Alan Sugar on The Apprentice.  He points his finger at you in his demeaning way and asks "So Richard, why should I not fire you?"

A - (Branson laughs and then gives a small pause for thought) "Because if you do fire me, I will compete against you".

All too often we Brits like to knock down our business heroes, but there's far worse things you could do than read his biography.  If there was ever a case for a person that makes things happen, it is he.

Sam