Citizen Brand

Happy Lee National Denim Day 2007

It's not too late to throw on your jeans and mosey on over to DenimDay.com to make your five dollar donation to fund research looking for early detection of breast cancer.  That is where the money donated for Lee National Denim Day goes now.  It's not just about building awareness or education anymore.  Your five dollars goes directly to researchers at some of America's leading research clinics who are working together on a landmark project.

So give up that Starbucks just one day and help these incredible scientists in their mission.  Today, wearing your jeans means something very special.

Cause it's the right thing to do.....

Check out Razoo.com and their $10,000 contest to engage us to get more involved.  Razoo is a a new web platform designed to mobilize people for positive social change.  Or if you want to dip your toe in the Razoo water, you can check out their blog and see what they are all about.

This is also a great time to remind you that Lee National Denim Day is Friday, October 5.  This is the 12th year for this great grassroots program that has raised over $67 million dollars toward research and education about breast cancer.  There is a new way for you to get involved in Denim Day this year in addition to your workplace.  You can start your own team and get your friends, family or even strangers involved in helping to fight breast cancer.

Perhaps the coolest thing about Lee National Denim Day now is where your dollars are going.  The Entertainment Industry Foundation has launched its Women's Cancer Research Fund. Focused on early detection of cancer, the initiative is supporting EIF's Breast Cancer Biomarker Discovery Project—an ambitious, groundbreaking scientific project where a group of internationally recognized scientists and clinicians from some of the best scientific institutions in the world are collaborating to develop a blood test that will detect breast cancer in its beginning stages, when survival rates are highest.

I had the opportunity to hear a presentation from the group of doctors from the best universities and hospitals in the USA who are conducting this research.  The work they are doing will yield important results and it is so gratifying to be able to tell each person who donates five dollars and wears their jeans on Denim Day this year that their donation is making a REAL difference in the fight against breast cancer.

If your company has yet to sign up for Denim Day, please take the lead and get them to sign up and if you work from home - create your own team.  Either way, you will know you are doing something good.

Seeing RED

My email rang yesterday with a request from my former colleague Andy and I am going to do my best to answer.  The subject is Product Red and my opinion about it.  I have been observing and thinking about this campaign as it has unfolded and here is what I think.

I'm disappointed.  I'm a little mad.  But I think cause branding as a strategy will survive the excesses of Product Red.  I believe that because if you step back from the edge of the cliff and view the campaign, Product Red is not cause branding.  It is a product promotion campaign.  Granted, it is a big product promotion campaign executed on a global scale.  But cause branding it is not.

When the news broke this week that Product Red had spent $100 million on marketing and returned $18 million to the cause of fighting AIDS in Africa, it was like a slap in the face to all of us who believe in cause branding not just as a marketing tool, but as a real way to make change in the world.  The Better Business Bureau says charitable efforts must return a minimum of 65 percent of all proceeds to the cause to be considered successful.  Product Red has a ways to go to meet the BBB minimum.

Product Red is all the rage right now.  We know because clients we are working with are constantly referencing it with envy and admiration.  It's big and bold and it has certainly captured the attention of the world.  But thus far too much money has been spent for too little return and the celebrities involved have outshone the cause itself.  That is why I don't want this program confused with true cause branding efforts.

Perhaps Product Red is creating a new category for which we will need to come up with a new moniker.  Maybe we call it marketing cause instead of cause marketing.  That may seem like semantics, but the simple juxtaposition of the two words illustrates that there is a difference between selling products to benefit a cause and creating a program that educates, enlightens and raises money for solutions to a societal problem.

I'm sure there are people who will disagree with my opinion.  I may have even offended a potential client out there somewhere.  I'm comfortable with that.  I know from the great organizations that we are now working with that there is a great understanding of the power of true cause branding. 

What do all of you think of Product Red?  Let's keep this conversation going.  I have my opinion, but I believe this is an important discussion for us to have if we care about cause, public relations and branding.

So now Andy, all we have to do is figure out how you can possibly dislike the Beatles. 

PRWeek/Barkley Cause Survey

There is much going on at our company these days.  We simplified our name; added a rocket to our logo; and we are getting ready to move into new digs in a building that Howard Hughes once roamed around in when he owned Trans World Airlines.

We are now simply known as Barkley.  It's the name most people have referred to us for years.  And in mid-November, we move into our new offices in the Crossroads Arts District of Kansas City in a building that was once TWA's world headquarters.  Howard Hughes put a rocket on top of the building to signify his dream that someday TWA would take passengers into outer space.  We have put the rocket back on the building as we bring this classic retro modern building back to life.

For us the rocket signifies our company's desire to explore and discover new ways to help our clients succeed.  One of the growing ways we are doing that is through cause branding.  And for the second consecutive year, Barkley Public Relations has partnered with PRWeek Magazine to sponsor a survey on the state of cause branding.  If you have not seen it yet. you can read it or download it at our website - www.beappr.com.

This year, we tried something new.  We conducted a consumer survey, PRWeek's first ever.  We talked with members of three different generations - Gen Y; Gen X; and, the Boomers.  We learned that all generations continue to see the growing importance of corporations partnering with non profits to further causes through education, awareness and funding.  There are differences as you would suspect there would be.

Boomers are more trusting of companies in general while the Gen X'ers (30-41 years old) are the most skeptical and trust corporate motivations the least.  Two thirds of all respondents said it is important to know why a company has chosen to support a particular cause.  And by almost a three to one margin, all respondents said a company should support a variety of causes as opposed to supporting only a single cause.

Almost two thirds (64%) of all respondents said they have purchased a branded product because it supports a cause they believe in.  And almost nine out of ten said it is important for companies to support causes or charitable organizations.

I encourage you to take a look at the entire survey and accompanying article in the October 23 edition of PRWeek.  Please let us know what you think of the data and give us feedback so we can make the 2007 survey even better.

Lee National Denim Day - October 6

Lee National Denim Day is Friday, October 6.  So many people are lending a hand as we approach the 11th celebration of the largest single day fund raiser for breast cancer research.

In addition to our friends at Dunder Mifflin and Pierce Brosnan, now a number of other celebrities have taken time to design and decorate denim pockets and put them up for auction.  Find out more at CharityFolks.com

There is still time for you to join thousands of other companies and organizations everywhere to help in the fight against breast cancer.  Click here to go to www.denimday.com and register today.  Your donation will go to an incredible research project being done by eight of the leading cancer research hospitals in America through the Entertainment Industry Foundation's Women's Cancer Programs.

Dunder Mifflin goes Denim

The cast of the Emmy Award winning comedy "The Office" is jumping in to help our clients Lee Jeans and the Entertainment Industry Foundation with Lee National Denim Day.  The cast took time out recently to produce this public service announcement that will run on the NBC network and on individual NBC affiliates between now and October 6.

If you, your company or other organizations you are affiliated with have not yet signed up to participate this year, now is the perfect time to join the fight to find a cure for breast cancer.  Just go to www.denimday.com to sign up.  Then on October 6, put on your jeans and donate five dollars to EIF's Women's Cancer Programs.

Through Lee's partnership with the EIF, the dollars donated through Lee National Denim Day will directly fund the early detection and treatment research and community breast cancer programs.  For the first time ever, seven of the leading cancer research institutions are working together to help dramatically increase the rate at which laboratory breakthroughs can be translated to more effective therapies for patients.

The seven institutions are:

Johns Hopkins University; Harvard University; M.D. Anderson Cancer Center; UCLA; University of Chicago; University of Washington (Seattle); and, Vanderbilt University.

Our company has been proud to be a part of the success of Lee National Denim Day for the past ten years.  I can't wait to once again wear my jeans for a great cause on October 6.

A better role than 007

I reported to you a few weeks ago that our client, Lee Jeans, has named a new beneficiary to begin its second decade of fighting breast cancer.  And today, one of the first benefits of that new partnership with the Entertainment Industry Foundation was announced.

Pierce Brosnan, one of Hollywood's biggest stars, will be the lead ambassador for Lee National Denim Day in 2006.  One of the things that is great about this is that Brosnan is currently the Honorary Chair of EIF, so his willingness to be spokesperson this year is a great way to kick off the new partnership between Lee Jeans and EIF.

If you or your organization have participated in Lee National Denim Day over the past ten years, we offer our thanks.  If you have never participated before, we invite you to check it out and consider coming on board in 2006.

For more details, go to DenimDay.com.