Tim,

Good post. I think JOINRED.COM best exemplifies the impact clebrities have on cause marketing in two ways: 1) they generate buzz, 2) and they generate business support.

Although most of us cannot gain access to Bono and Bobby Shriver, local businesses can benefit from local celebrities when they launch a co-branding campaign with a good cause.

Lewis

Great idea because it makes it so easy for people to help. Let's be honest, most people want to help, but are lazy. This way all we have to do is buy a particular product. And red is such a popular color, items such as the red iPod Nano will be viewed as a sort of 'limited edition' since they are red.

Great story Ted!

Tim,

Great post on a great campaign.

I couldn't agree more with Lewis' challenge to small businesses: how can you ride the coattails of this campaign and benefit a worthy charity at the same time? How can you support other well-known causes?

Last year, I had a small business - a petite ladies clothing boutique - join the breast cancer awareness cause by commissioning a line of locally designed costume jewelry sold exclusively in her shop to benefit the local Komen chapter. She generated many new customers as a result of this effort - and donated a lot of cash to a great cause.

So glad you posted on this. And I genuinely appreciate when you wrote:

"While this sounds like a straight-forward concept, it takes a massive effort on the part of many people to make something like this happen. Product and service companies are stepping up and making the commitment to do their part to support RED."

Yes, the logistics and dedication that a program with this many moving parts--and products--necessitates is nothing short of miraculous. You know, with all the hours we pull and time we invest, it must be especially rewarding when the outcome is so advancing. Thanks again for covering this. It's a great program to watch grow and a good example to use with my own clients.

Your Blog is currently being accessorized with red. See! We are behind the scenes with our paint brushes & buckets contributing to this wonderful motion ;-)

Brilliant positioning. Red in marketing
means "Buy Now"!!

I love their (red) Blog
http://joinred.blogspot.com/

Thanks to everyone who has weighed in on this important initiative, thus far. Lewis, even more important than celebrity endorsements, in my view, are the countless product and service companies that are stepping up to the plate to help support this worthy cause. To Marianna's point: you bet, businesses large and small can do their part to support worthwhile causes, as well as large corporations. CK, the thought of what it takes to pull something like this together is truly mind-boggling. I'm hoping Product Red will be seen as a blueprint for future cause marketing launches, large scale or modest. Kudos to the thousands of unsung heroes--product planners, service providers, marketers and media people who are doing their part to make this happen. We, as consumers, have the easy part. All we need to do is buy Red to support this important cause.

Life is Good,the clothing company, ran a wonderful fund-raiser on Boston Common last weekend, a pumpkin carving event aimed at breaking the world record for simultaneously lit pumpkins. They also raised $250K to help Camp Sunshine (camp for sick kids). I live in downtown Boston and walked through the Common just after they'd lit up the 30,000+ pumpkins - great crowd and a magical moment. The next day, I saw all kinds of people walking around with Life is Good shopping bags. So life is good for Life Is Good, as well as for Camp Sunshine.

No celebrities involved (that I saw), but lots of positive local coverage. (Plus - and this is a big plus for people in the neighborhood - they cleaned up after themselves. By Sunday there was little evidence rotting pumpkins!)

Maura Welch of the Boston Globe wrote about this the other day. (Link below.)

http://www.boston.com/business/blog/filter/2006/10/brand_is_good.html

My only point regarding celebrities is that in my experience, large companies are more likely to step up when they can attach themselves to well-known celebrities or causes. Both apply in your example containing Bono and AIDS in Africa.

I think cause marketing becomes much more challenging when either of those elements is missing.

As a grassroots organizer with two different NGOs, both struggled to recruit companies to our causes until Martin Sheen came aboard at one of the NGOs. Then life became much easier at that NGO.

Lewis

I've posted on this fantastic campaign for our nonprofit marketing audience. Someone needs to prepare the equivalent of a Harvard Business School case study on this effort. It sure looks like everything is being done right, setting a high bar for future cause marketing initiatives.

I first learnt about the campaign a few weeks ago. The New Yorker magazine was full of Gap ads about this RED campaign saying they will donate half of the profits generated by RED products. It seemed very lame to me. They are spending A LOT of $ in advertising, but donating 'only' half of the profits of 'only' the RED products.
Just a thought.

Bono, Bobby Shriver & Oprah

Celebs for Red

Scarlett Johansson
Charlize Teron

http://celebrityjpg.com/2006/10/15/do-the-red-thing/ shows the pix
Annie Liebowitz took.

For the public sector and the celebs if we can use this to fight this dreadful disease, looks like everyone is working hard on resolution. It will be interesting to see the power stats from your studies above as well as what is reported over the next 2 weeks.
Kathy

Thanks, Lewis. As usual, you make very salient points. Guchi, while companies are only donating a percentage of the profits from Red products, the total contribution can be quite significant. Think of all the red iPod Nanos that will be sold, for example. For this campaign to be successful over the long haul, celebrities and companies will have to stay focused on continuing their marketing efforts. Otherwise, when the freshness of the newest, latest marketing push wears off, our attention and efforts to support this cause will probably fade.

I agree that if you look at this as purely a cause marketing effort, it is clearly a success. But if you look at it from a social marketing perspective -- how effective is it at creating real change and addressing the reason the campaign is needed -- it's not as cut and dried. It's great that money for AIDS treatment is being generated from products people would probably be buying anyways. But is this just a distraction from the real social and political change that has to happen to reduce poverty and AIDS in Africa? Is promoting rampant consumerism really the answer?
(I wrote about this here: http://www.social-marketing.com/blog/2006/10/red-campaign-distraction-or-lifesaver.html)

Actually, I do think it can be part of the answer. But we should not lose sight of the fact that this is just treating the symptoms of the problem, not solving the problem. Bono's ONE campaign, which does encourage political/social action, seems like it could be a good companion to (RED), but they need to do much more to cross-promote the two campaigns. Just buying some sunglasses should not be enough.

Joe Waters at Selfish Giving has a great post in which he lays out the pros and cons to the campaign.
http://www.selfishgiving.com/2006/10/if_december_is_.html

Nedra,
You raise some very important points. However, we have to start somewhere to raise consciousness of some of our thorniest problems around the globe. Bono's efforts are pragmatic and will help raise visibility for the horrible plight of millions of people in Africa. It's a good start. Hopefully, many people will support the cause and some who have additional resources will find it in their hearts to do much more.

Ted,
I'm hoping this thoughtful post gets lots of other folks, and lots of businesses ideas for grassroots efforts they can initiate to make things better in their communities and the world at large. Every great idea is inspired by something and starts as a small seed. Let's hope RED sparks lots of other much-needed efforts!

Ted: great post. Yes, you'd think that brands would take the forefront of this kind of initiative, but the fact is that "the brand we call Bono" was best suited to take the lead.

You think of Bono and you immediately connect with ONE, Africa, and social activism. Importantly, this brand has huge credibility, not because he's a musician but because he's working the political angle from the inside. He's not throwing bricks at the president -- he's talking to him. With respect. Wow. Maturity and wisdom coming from the music industry. Look out for that forecasted rain of frogs.

The reason most of the corporate world doesn't get involved is that CEO's don't get paid to do good in the world -- they get paid to make safe bets that maximize shareholder value. I'm not saying it's a good thing; it's just a thing we need to deal with. Bono, with his credible brand, makes it safer.

So good on him.

I think we could save the world with a ruthless combination of cause-related marketing and sin taxes. Now there's a manifesto!

Thanks.

Hi Stephen,

You've made some excellent points here. As you say, Bono, as a social activist, has a unique brand identity that lends great credibility to cause marketing efforts like RED. While lots of CEOs aren't yet oriented to cause marketing, more and more of them are getting on board with supporting worthwhile causes and putting marketing behind them. As I stated before, we have to start somewhere and projects like RED should inspire more efforts in all sectors of our society.

eliminate aids in africa? are you all fucking americans, or what?
what about america,you dont think we should eliminate aids here?
so many questions and no answers.i dont think it's right that you are so worried about other countries,that you ignore the one in which you live!! I am so furious that I will never purchase sprint products, or any other products that you all advertise,and will pass this info on to everyone that i know!!