Is the #CokeDrones campaign no more than ‘rodeo PR’?
Was air-lifting free cans of Coke to foreign construction workers in Singapore a genuine act of kindness? Or no more than ‘rodeo PR’ from the world’s most famous brand, wonders Robin Hicks.
I wrote a fairly excitable opinion piece about camera drones the other day. I suggested how useful they could be for journalism and brands. A journalist friend of mine, Rob O’Brien, called me out on it soon after, wondering half jokingly if I’d been paid to write the piece. He was, with good enough reason, skeptical about their usefulness in the real world.
But then yesterday, out of the blue as it were, a press release landed in my inbox from Coca-Cola. They had used drones to drop free cans of the fizzy drink out of the sky and into the hands of foreign construction workers in Singapore. It was a stunt conceived in collaboration with the Singapore Kindness Movement, a curious non-profit group set up to encourage Singaporeans to be kinder to one another – a nice fit with Coke’s global ‘Open Happiness’ campaign.
Smugly, I emailed Rob to share the news.
Within minutes, Rob, who has interviewed a number of construction workers in Singapore for various newspapers locally and overseas, wrote back: “The last migrant worker I interviewed said he was really keen for a Coke on a high rise building. He hadn’t been paid in six months. But nothing a Coke can’t fix!”
Soon after, a comment appeared beneath our story about the #CokeDrones campaign, a beautifully craft awards video for which you can watch here:
The comment reads: “It does not solve anything for anyone and is kind of a scam. Why couldn’t they have just handed the Cokes out to them as PEOPLE instead of dropping them like food aid?”
At this point I felt like, well, a bit of a wally – even as a marketing journalist who writes about this stuff all day.
It appears that once more Coke has lunged into a serious social and political issue, as it did by giving away free Cokes to Pakistanis and Indians who interacted via special vending machines last year (which, of course, won awards galore), and as it did with a pledge to tackle bullying in the Philippines for one day a year, with the sort of sincerity you’d find in the dregs at the bottom of a bottle of fizzy pop.
I asked Coke’s Southeast Asia marketing director Leonardo O’Grady about this very issue, and the point of the ‘Open Happiness’ campaign, in an interview last year. He answered: “The brand idea is be an antidote to modern day woes, and make a commitment to ‘open happiness’. We don’t think we can solve the world’s problems, but the brand does believe that small gestures can inspire individuals.”
But why would the world’s most famous brand, and one of the world’s most powerful, deal in small gestures? Coke, with a market capitalisation of US$168.7 billion (according to Forbes), can’t in any way be described as small.
#CokeDrones comes just six months after the company showed the sort of action that might just attract a bit more credibility. It stopped advertising to focus its efforts on the Typhoon Haiyan relief effort in the Philippines, and put a beleaguered, overstretched government to shame in the process. Yes, the company still trumpeted its efforts through the media. But it’s the sort of PR that people can actually get behind and, dare it be said, admire you for.
In another email about #CokeDrones, Rob, who works with NGOs in Singapore and until recently was a media specialist as PR agency Weber Shandwick, went on: “Migrant workers in Singapore are used to being exploited, so while I’m sure the lads loved being in this promo, it won’t make an iota of difference to their lives – the real beneficiaries of a stunt like this are Coke and drones. It is cute, but if their message of kindness isn’t sustained it will be filed in the folder marked ‘Everything that irritates people about brands and PR today’ – that they are never quite ‘in’ an issue, but happy to use it to ‘conceptualise’ a quick PR stunt.”
“I’d challenge them [Coke and their agency] to go beyond its drones, to do something more sustainable… that isn’t designed for a few thousand Facebook likes,” he says.
“There are many good storytellers documenting this problem in Singapore, they’re not in short supply, but are large brands willing to show that this sentiment goes beyond a PR brainstorm and is core to their values? That’s the question that badly needs to be asked, as NGOs generally need all the support they can get.”
He adds: “If a video of drones delivering Coke to migrant workers is the beginning and end of their involvement, I’d be disappointed and it would show what a lot suspect to be true of these types of campaigns – that they are using serious social issues and riding them like rodeo cowboys.”
So, seriously Coke. Who do you think you are? What are you? The UN? Amnesty International? Or a soft drink manufacturer dropping a free drink into troubled waters?
You’re bigger than that. Act like it.
Robin Hicks
Robin
ReplyYou raised some very good points but I doubt anything will change.
The fact that all of Coke’s socially-directed Happiness stunts come with professionally crafted award videos betray their true motivation.
Real change takes second place to awards and peer applause.
Don’t kid yourself otherwise.
Real change comes from the uncredited local volunteers who distribute food parcels to migrant workers, work behind the scenes to ensure fair treatment, raise funds when injured migrant workers are dumped on the road by errant employers.
A can of sugar fizzy drink is not a cure to real problems.
Neither should it be expected to.
This is what is is.
Just another cause to be entered in a lottery to win fancy paperweights so all involved get to keep their jobs for another award cycle.
Real charity is when the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand gives.
Well said Robin. Dropping cans of 8 teaspoons of sugar in fizzy water to people who are effectively slave labour is no more than a huge slap in the face by a brand that should know better.
ReplyI have known about Coca Cola’s affiliation with happiness and positive psychology on their website for a long time.
This PR stunt is obviously based on Positive Psychology’s random acts of kindness to generate happiness, which explains why they teamed up with Singapore Kindness Movement. Random acts of kindness are traditionally meant to be small and not big, which could be why the gesture to deliver free coke can be perceived to be ‘small’.
Positive Psychology groups happiness into 4 types: hedonic(pleasure), eudaimonic(greater good, meaning, purpose, concern for others), chaironic(spiritual oneness) and prudential(ease of flow).
This form of happiness generated from delivering free coke is grouped into eudaimonic happiness for the doers and hedonic happiness for the receivers.
ReplyHi Robin, I think it is a part of Coke’s global strategy, deployed in a locally contextual way. I saw this ad a while ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPIREwZ193Q with a similar idea for Sprite on Turkey beaches.
Having said that, I think if you were to see it from the perspective of a labourer, it would surely make them happy being thought of. They surely are the last on anyone’s minds and even though there is PR value, as a marketer, the first question is, what sales is this going to drive? Probably nil as the labourers are not Coke’s target audience. I’d say, it is a good campaign, very relevant to Singapore. What say you?
ReplyMaddie, I says it’s the direct result of an angry email from tkm to ec saying, “cannes is almost here, where are my f#@^%ing awards? Cheers
ReplyEna – you got me smiling mate. Yah, I can see that. The f%&*@$g Cannes awards. Life is all about that hey. Good one.
ReplyMaddie, good points, but probably a good idea to declare that Coke is a client of yours at this point.
ReplyIf anyone tried playing with those damn remote copters, they’d know just how little lifting power it has.
ReplyDoubt it can lift a case of cokes 10 meters, let alone 10 floors.
Hi Robin – as you and I had discussed, my praise for the campaign was for the work O&M had done who are competitors to the agency I work for and written purely from the perspective of the labourers. Indeed Coke is a client but not in Singapore where the campaign was developed and ran. My views may be the only positive ones here but not because I am biased or I could have written it anonymously. Also, they are my own and not reflective of the company I work for. I have given O&M their due credit even in my social channels prior to you posting this article. Cheers.
ReplyHey maddie thanks for your purely impartial view.
I was speaking to the foreman on the site that the drones visited…he was livid and claimed they disrupted the schedule for hours.
He later forced the workers to work double time shift for no pay…but allowed them to keep the coke. What a sweet deal.
ReplyCoca Cola is a respected company. Why are thy doing this kind of stunt. They care for people then they should help people in a honest way. Having coke dropped is a stunt? Why are they doing it? They can just go and give Coke to people. Better still they make bottled water, so they can give bottled water to people. I think Coca Cola should do their honest good will marketing honestly. PR stunts like this are not suitable to Coke. Is this Coke’s idea or some advertising company trying to get mileage through Coke? Also, this makes Singapore government look bad. Do they not care for well-being of immigrants? Workers? Coke you should replace this initiative with a genuine effort to improve the lives of these people. All the best!
ReplyThe last migrant worker I interviewed was 19-year-old Masum – he was fired from his job and kicked out of his dorm – he had no cash and slept on the floor of a hawker centre in Little India for weeks. When we chatted he was stressed and upset that he had to be deported – mainly because his Dad had sold land and cattle to send him to Singapore in the first place. But, nothing an ice cold Coke couldn’t sort out!
Reply@ Stavros – have you lodged a complaint with the MOM about this foreman if you have spoken to him and he has admitted to not paying the labourers? From the way I see it, for something like this to be staged and cameras filming the reactions of the labourers, in a country like Singapore, all permissions need to be in place.
ReplyThis is pure exploitation on Coke’s part!! So many of my schoolmates and I are completely outraged by this stunt by Coke so much so that we are planning to organize a student protest and boycott at SUTD. This is not how we Singaporeans want to be known in our efforts to better the world. Not through these kinds of corporate ploys.
Reply@ Rob – I am sympathetic to the labour conditions not just in Singapore but across Asia and work in the industry that fights for labour rights. Though I think we need to put coke’s efforts into perspective. It is not a CSR campaign; it is an advertising campaign. The plight of labourers should be a concern to the Singapore govt., to the human rights groups, to all brands that use labourers/ factory workers but we can’t go there. Not at this point of time. We have to look at this as a campaign in the context of how it has been deployed in a country that is seeking to be more inclusive of labourers – a community that has thus far been neglected even though they are a part of our society.
ReplyI once wrote a letter to TODAY in 2004 that eventually led to the improvement of construction workplace safety in lieu of the then-LTA’s(before it received a major overhaul) 1 million dollar reward for safety in construction sites that was much more lax. I think that was the last major improvement done for construction workers.
The labour condition for construction workers is bad and the pay is relatively low, but why the workers are sustaining the local low-wage system is mainly due to their home countries’ poor economy and over-population for countries like India and China.
Perhaps the drones should be used to drop condoms instead.
ReplyThis is a disingenuous and cheap attempt to create a feel good moment of happiness. It is fake, like most Singaporean’s concern for foreign workers. No offense, Singapore. Like so many ‘viral’ campaigns today it is a contrived behind the scenes film that is effectively the making of a ‘moment’. How often does the original ‘moment’ reach only a tiny proportion of people in such stunts? Almost 100% of the time. We have to rely on YouTube for anyone to ever see it. How long did the actual exercise of ‘refreshing’ the workers last? It lasted precisely as long as Ogilvy’s crew took to shoot enough footage of some Bangladeshi workmen. Then someone cried, ‘CUT’. The interviews were vomit inducing. Exactly, how many ordinary people were involved and in turn made aware of the plight of the workers? I didn’t see any of the true issues faced by foreign workers there. This piece of theater is a ‘look at us, we’re so creative’ wank from Ogilvy Singapore – and we should take particular exception to this because it is such a serious issue that Ogilvy/Coke have trivialized for their own ends. Singapore, you want to thank the foreign workers? Pay them more than a few dollars a day – or the price of a can of Coke!! There is no reach or frequency in this idea, unless it gets a shitload of hits on YouTube. Let me give you an example of a valuable public service campaign. Most people are well aware of maid abuse being such a huge issue in that country. Sponsor a massive Coke outreach program and make it easier for people to report abuse via an app – or God knows what clever idea that will actually make a small difference. Give 5 cents from each sale to establish a new hospice for badly abused maids or injured workers – and some legal assistance. As if this will happen, of course. You know how many maids ‘accidentally’ fall to their death in Singapore each year? What would Ogilvy’s solution be to assist these waifs? Can you see the difference between a genuine public service campaign versus the patter they claim is an idea? What benefit whatsoever has that stunt brought these indentured workers? Sorry, ‘Guests’. And don’t insult our collective intelligence claiming that it has done anything to improve their station in life among the locals. Phua! These are people that begrudge giving their maid a day off once a month, house them in a closet and feed them on scraps. Fact. A real public service campaign of any value would focus on how it is that workers are allowed to live in shipping containers with no proper ventilation, without aircon. Massive fail.
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