10 Yetis Examples of Good and Bad PR – Monday 5th August 2019

August is finally here and hasn't this year flown by, soon we'll be asking colleagues if they have done all of their Christmas shopping, ah the joys! Anyway, enough of that chat here are my favourite examples of good and bad PR from the past week, enjoy.

Good PR

Paddy Power

Just in time for the football season to kick off, sports betting website Paddy Power have launched a campaign tackling the issue of heavy branding on football shirts, scoring them points amongst many frustrated fans.

A satirical advert premiered on Friday night that called out rivals for treating their football shirts like they were billboards. This comes after the bookmakers revealed plans for their redesign of the new Huddersfield Town’s kit, with the logo emblazoned across the shirts like hen-do sash.After a series of complaints from outraged fans, the sponsors announced that it was indeed a hoax, designed to promote the latest ‘Save Our Shirts’ campaign.

Although this PR stunt bordered on breaking the sponsorship guidelines established by the FA themselves, Paddy Power continued to reiterate their point to stop over-branding football shirts.

The advert was released to celebrate the ‘unsponsoring’ of numerous clubs such as Newport County and Macclesfield Town. A grumpy pigeon is featured on one disgruntled player’s shirt in the opening of the film. Another scene depicts a player sat at the bus stop attempting to spark up conversation with a woman in a shirt sponsored by ‘LittleBluePill’, leading to the woman hastily averting her eyes.

A series of audacious logos are featured in the film, leading to the ‘Save Our Shirts’ campaign being introduced by the betting giants, who announced that for every team they sponsor, they are removing their logo from team shirt in an attempt to make them less like billboards.

Not afraid of a PR stunt, the betting shop have already garnered huge amounts of publicity from this campaign, with fans branding it ‘genius’.Twitter users agreed with the message questioning how much advertising is too much advertising, urging more betting firms to steer clear of sponsoring shirts.

Nando’s

With A-level and GCSE results days fast approaching, Portuguese food chain Nando’s has announced that they are giving out free meals to students. Whether students want a celebratory feast or a meal to drown their sorrows, the restaurant is offering a treat either way, the only catch is that £7 will be needed to be spent in order to qualify, All students need to do is present a copy of their results and ID.

The free food available consists of a quarter of a chicken or an item from the fire-started menu worth up to £4.10. The offer is only available on respective results days and can be accessed across all of the 420 UK restaurants.

This ingenious marketing campaign by the brand encourages students to spend money in their restaurants with the prospect of free food as a result, equating in greater profits incurred by the brand through drawing more students in.

The demonstration of empathy shown towards students by Nando’s is enough to raise the profile of the brand in consumers’ eyes, serving as a great piece of PR for the brand.

Bad PR

McDonald’s

Global fast food chain McDonald’s have been accused of pulling off a strategic PR stunt after insiders leaked that their new and highly unpopular paper straws are less recyclable than their plastic counterparts.

The giant rolled out paper straws in all of their UK straws in April 2018, however they gained a poor reception from the outset due to their notorious tendency to crumble into drinks. McDonald’s claimed that they had fixed this issue by strengthening their paper straws, leading to them not being able to be processed by their recycling providers.

The rolling out of paper straws initially contributed to a series of good press due to the company’s apparent recognition of the harm that single use plastics can cause. However, many are now stating that it was merely an attempt to appease environmental activists as the straws are sent straight to the ‘general waste’ bins.

Twitter users were quick to comment on the fact that although McDonald’s have rolled out ‘eco-friendly’ straws, the drinks all still have plastic lids, signifying the decision as more of a ‘hollow gesture’ than anything else.

The latest blunder is amongst a series of criticisms that the brand has faced of late, with customers also criticizing the use of plastic toys in happy meals. With the current state of the environment, it comes as no surprise that companies are choosing to go for more ‘eco-friendly’ options, however, as with the case of McDonalds, it should be looked into whether the brand is doing this out of genuine good will or whether it is causing more harm than good in a ploy to keep consumers satisfied.

Google Summit

A week of bad pr for Google as they hosted a secretive summit in Italy last week, dubbed Google Camp. Numerous members of the world’s rich and famous attended the event, including Katy Perry and Leonardo DiCaprio. The Duke of Sussex was also in attendance, giving an impassioned speech on the importance of protecting our environment.

Ironically, this event has come under fire as the attempts to educate on the importance of saving Mother Earth were overshadowed by the exhaustive measures taken to get to the Sicilian seaside. Google invited A-listers from all over the world, who then subsequently arrived on 114 private jets, sports cars, helicopters and mega yachts, punishing Mother Earth in the process.

The tech giant spent $20 billion on the initiative, with social media users alluding to the idea that Google would rather look the part than actually take part in protecting the planet.