Selling the bad stuff
Cigarettes, gambling, booze and the Church of Scientology – would your agency take them on as clients? Robin Hicks asks what’s more important, money or morals.
Advertising agencies. What do the brands on your client list say about you? Do you carefully pick who you’ll work for? Or, since times are tough, will you merrily pimp the devil for a buck? Or – advertising being advertising – do morals fly out the window as soon as you join the game?
Now, we’re not suggesting the Church of Scientology is an evil client. But, as a brand, Scientology has an image that cannot accurately be described as Godly. So it was interesting that just last week – if what the Scientologists are claiming is true – “the best of Australia’s marketing agencies” were falling over themselves to work for what senator Nick Xenophon once referred to as a “criminal organisation”.
Michael Abdul is the founder of The Sphere Agency, a smallish independent Melbourne agency with 20 staff and clients such as Interflora, Bosch and Melbourne Heart football club. He says he wouldn’t work with the Church of Scientology because he is a Christian (an executive at a PR firm said she wouldn’t work with them because she’s Jewish). But Abdul feels less strongly about Scientology than he does about online gambling.
interesting article. I’m not one to judge much but that doesn’t mean I don’t have personal ethical stances on things. That said, I have found myself working for political groups that I don’t support and animal ‘health’ products when I am in fact a vego… Whoring seems to be a part of what we do… and there’s always another whore waiting in the wings to charge less or pick up rejected ‘evil’ accounts…
I’d like someone to explain what, exactly, is “immoral” about cigarettes, alcohol and gambling?
“Ill advised”, possibly, when taken to extremes, but all are legal, and surely a matter of personal choice. Almost anything at all on the planet taken to an extreme, could be equally as harmful as any of these things.
Personally, I think it’s just as “immoral” to continue to breed children that you have not a hope in hell of paying for, or sitting on your date drawing “public” money when there’s bugger all wrong with you, but does this mean I wouldn’t work on any product that these people would buy? Probably not.
Addictive stuff sells itself . . . doesn’t it?
Good article. Morality is always an important issue and despite inaccurate,negative perceptions that our industry will do anything for money, most agency principals think carefully about the business they work on. For my part I have no problem working on gambling products, but the Church of Scientology would be a different matter. The legal system ensures everyone is entitled to have a lawyer defend their rights however guilty a person might appear to be. It is perhaps naive to be too critical of people who have different beliefs and if they feel they want to run an account than so be it.
I worked for a gambling organisation for 7 years and was never once offered cocaine at a work function.
It took 2 weeks after joining a media/advertising organisation…
What a load of rubbish. Every agency has their price for one. Secondly, What about the magazines, newspapers, tv networks who took millions in tobacco ad revenue when they knew it had health effects. Lets not forget Cosmetics has animal testing, fast food obesity with trans fats, coke with sugar. Do you eat fish as the oceans are over fished so you are a guilty party. Do you buy products produced in China where appalling human rights and working conditions are at play. Where’s the line? There isn’t one my friend, not in advertising and not on moral issues as every category has their issues. This so called moralistic stance is a rubber facade for guilt ridden ad execs who try and justify why they cannot win any business. Clowns.
@The Awful Truth – with that logic i presume the only thing stopping you from selling guns and drugs to school children is your concern of legal implications.
Pointing to others and crying “we’ll their doing it too” isn’t good enough.
@Technojames your point is rather diminished as you only worked for one employer in each field and your experience does not reflect either industry as a whole.
@simon – thanks for sharing your wisdom – not sure what you are saying however Im sure it makes sense in your own mind which is the main thing. Have another read and try and work out what I was saying – common sense may evade you inside that brain however maybe try and read others. Have a nice day.
@The Awful truth – i am sorry if have misunderstand what your message is but to me it reads forget ethics and morality – just buy/sell the product ?
If i have interpreted this incorrectly please excuse me.
@simon – I’m saying where do we/you draw the line? ie: China – appalling human rights and animal welfare issues however we celebrate the Beijing Olympics whereby thousands of locals lost their homes for venues. We seem to forget this – so do we boycott China, its millions of products we wear and give our children as toys everyday?. Most do not, we happily continue to purchase. Cigarettes – in the UK most councils have money tied up in tobacco stock as do many pension funds as it is a blue chip defensive stock in recessionary times. Our lines of where we stop are hazy based upon our needs. The hypocrisy is rife in all categories. So i struggle to understand the boundaries to operate within with so many blurred lines.
@The Awful Truth – mate i agree and i think it’s time to accept that in most cases we are in fact enabling our own demise by way of what we buy and invest in.
We are mostly all guilty and have to turn it around.
The superannuation point you mentioned is a perfect example – how many of us know exactly what we have invested in ?
Supporting corporations in pumping billions out of our own country to our own detriment (google ahem) is just plain madness.
Time to draw a line in the sand at the and we’ve got to start somewhere.
good chat , thanks
@TheAwfulTruth: Sounds to me like you’re saying there can be no line. But I think that line must be draws somewhere. If society isn’t perfect (which it never will be) then that is no reason to say screw it all!
@The Awful Truth
As Chrrrris alludes, it seems you can’t see the difference between working on things like cigarettes (when you use it as directed it will kill you), gambling (the more you use it the more you will lose – it’s a mathematical certainty that is the busines case backbone for the whole industry), or things like China (where not all environmental or work practices are bad and international trade has actually done a lot to bring to improve local’s lives).
Just because you, “struggle to understand the boundaries to operate within with so many blurred lines”, doesn’t mean those with emotional intelligence and common sense do.