Iceland Christmas ad: banned, but it will help 2018 go down as the year of ‘corporate caring’
A UK supermarket has just had its Christmas ad banned, but was controversy part of the plan? Cathrine Jansson-Boyd explores the year of ‘corporate caring’ in this crossposting from The Conversation.
A Christmas advertisement for the UK supermarket chain Iceland, which tells the story of a young girl who tries to help a baby orangutan whose home has been destroyed to create palm oil, will not be broadcast on television. The short animation, voiced by actress Emma Thompson, highlights the devastating impact that deforestation for palm oil plantations has on orangutans.
But because the film was originally made by Greenpeace, Clearcast – the body responsible for clearing ads on behalf of the UK’s major broadcasters – decided that it breaches rules against political advertising. Richard Walker, the son of the supermarket chain’s founder, who had led a move towards environmental campaigning admitted: “We always knew there was a risk [the clip would not be cleared for TV] but we gave it our best shot.”
Yet from a marketing point of view, taking this risk makes perfect sense as it’s effectively a win–win. If the advert had been permitted to air on television, the company would have got the airing it wanted. But since it has been banned, Iceland tweeted to ask if the public will help share the advert – and people are doing just that.
Such a shame. Rules getting in the way of a important message.
They knew it would be banned as it wasn’t made by them and was made by Greenpeacs. It’s a smart move as they get a lot of coverage without much spend. They’ll spend what media budget they do have on promoting food. Of course it was planned this way.
Yeah, I expect they factored a very high likelihood of it getting banned.
That said – it’s a shame that it was. Given that it directly relates to a product decision, and had they produced exactly the same message themselves it probably would have remained.
Agree – smells of a strategy to me. A good one.
Small spend on social – viral reach from the “this great message got banned” angle – earned media coverage ensues.
Kudos to Iceland, both for supporting a good cause and being smart about it.
The Iceland film was very, very good. Most powerful ad I’ve seen in a long time.