10 Yetis Examples of Good and Bad PR – Monday 22nd July 2019

It’s Monday, there’s a heatwave due this week and I’m back again bringing you this week’s good and bad PR, good news just keeps on coming doesn’t it! Let’s get down to it then…

Good PR

Supermarket Sainsbury’s has changed one of its retailers names in Bath to Signsbury’s to support and promote deaf awareness as part of its 150 days of community initiative.

Their plan is to celebrate community inclusivity and encourage customers as well as colleagues to sign with one another. More than a hundred colleagues from this particular store in Bath took part in British Sign Language lessons where they plan to use their new skills during the Signsbury’s store opening for four days from the 18^th-21^st July to interact with customers.

Also, in the store, there will be screen installations that will demonstrate how to sign various words and phrases of items found around the supermarket such as ‘bananas’ and ‘milk’ so although many customers might not know sign language, they can still try and take part and take away a new skill that they might want to develop on and use in the future. Good going Sainsbury’s, hopefully more Signsbury’s stores will come to a city near you soon!

Bad PR

From one supermarket to another…Whilst Iceland tried to do a good thing in getting rid of all their plastic packaging, it soon backfired after their alternative packaging and loose items received backlash and didn’t live up to expectations, meaning that they haven’t had much choice but to re-introduce their plastic packaging until they have found another way to pack their products.

Things initially started to go wrong when the packaging to its bananas failed the trial and didn’t resonate with local shoppers. However, Iceland doesn’t plan to give up any time soon. Whilst they have had to return to plastic in the meantime (equating to more than 10 million plastic bags a year) they have decided to run a new trial from the 24^th of July that will see plastic-free banana packaging roll out across around 20 Iceland stores. Let’s hope this next trial runs more smoothly than the previous and we can say goodbye to plastic packaging for good!