Here's a link to an editorial I wrote for The Sportsbusiness Journal (ostensibly the Wall Street Journal of sports) about Reebok's Whodunit campaign from this summer. The campaign featured its four athletes (all black) as criminals in mug shots etc.

I guess Reebok won't be calling me anytime soon!

link


There is no passion to be found playing small, in settling for a life
that is less than the one you are capable of living. - Mandela

I guess I'll have to view it from home. I can't subscribe on the office computer.

Oh, sorry - I didn't realize the link wasn't directly to the article. I'll post it.

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'Whodunit?" Real Question is 'Why?'

The recent tragedies involving Kobe Bryant and Patrick Dennehy seem to hang over this summer’s sports world like a lingering fog. They add momentum to the groundswell about “spoiled” and “lawless” athletes and to the dubious legacies of contemporary sports personalities from Pete Rose to O.J. Simpson to Mike Price. Even the story about the odd disposition of Ted Williams’ body contributes to the growing sense that the world of sports is fundamentally “off kilter”. Of course, thoughtful people understand that issues present in society have no choice but also to exist in sports. Nevertheless, the accumulation of negative news has created a public relations and marketing challenge for those who build brands in this industry.

With that as context, and capped by the image of Kobe Bryant’s mug shot still fresh in our minds, this summer’s “Whodunit” campaign from Reebok (the Above The Rim brand) raises a number of perplexing questions. The TV spots center on an urban basketball court where detectives attempt to identify who committed a street ball “crime”. The commercials prominently show images of the brand’s NBA players in mug shots, a chalk body outline, and other imagery and dialogue that weave a story of hoop mystery. Although the intent of the advertising is clear, its impact is another matter. Do consumers really need to be reminded of the seamier side of sports, even if in jest? Does the campaign inadvertently contribute, even in the smallest of ways, to the growing negativity about athletes? Is it really in Above The Rim’s strategic interests to portray their marquee athletes as criminals? Further, why is crime the chosen metaphor here? Will we see it as a theme throughout Reebok’s other brands and product lines as well? If not, why not? What is it about this brand, sport, and consumer that make crime optimal strategy?

Reebok’s primary objectives were, ostensibly, to highlight their new shoes with their impressive endorsers. One can surmise that burnishing the brand’s “street credibility” was also a major consideration. Whatever the objectives, playing into negative aspects of sports would seem not to be the most strategic approach to maximizing brand equity. In fact, the more troubling elements of the campaign actually dilute the product and athlete performance messages designed to sell the product. Moreover, despite the drive for “street cred”, this campaign raises the question of whether the brand’s target consumers are given inappropriate messages about their heroes, their sport, and their environment. At a deeper level, does the campaign take liberties with its core urban consumers to satisfy the vicarious thrills of its suburban ones who are drawn to the chimerical “hardness” of urban life? By speaking through the language of criminality, does the campaign end up “dissing” the very consumers that it cherishes to keep the brand hot?

Even with the Above The Rim brand’s edgier, street ball, pedigree, the work tiptoes on the line of propriety by romanticizing a very serious issue. The perceived connection between young urban males and crime is far too serious a matter to exploit in this way. It feeds unhealthy stereotypes that, frankly, don’t need the additional hype, particularly from within sports. A brand’s relationship with its consumers can rest in a delicate balance. The culture and performance of the street ball game would seem to provide an enormously rich inventory of material to showcase. Why take the chance with messages that might not put your best brand and corporate foot forward?

Sports remain arguably the most powerful platform with which to build brands. If done well, it can be an extraordinary conduit to strong, loyal, and profitable consumer relationships. The most effective sports marketing is derived from tightly linking the positioning of a brand with the natural “positioning” of a sports asset. Companies can optimize all consumer-facing efforts by skillfully seeking out these strategic connections. With this in mind, Above The Rim can acquire all of the raw performance and attitude that it might want from the character and personality of its endorsers and the game that they play. In the end, in a world where every dollar of marketing investment and revenue are meaningful, why chance “shooting a brick” with your consumers?



There is no passion to be found playing small, in settling for a life
that is less than the one you are capable of living. - Mandela

Kenyon Martin

kenyon3.jpg (31 Kb, 170 downloads)

fftopic: I hope you don't mind me getting off topic for a while, but I saw something from stormfront.org that reminded me of this commercial.

Now I'm not saying that AA.org is anything remotely similar to stormfront.org. But there was a thread there about a commercial that ticked them off.

It was the new Pepsi Vanilla commercial. Some, if not most of the people there at the site were saying that the Pepsi commercial was racist towards whites.

To those who haven't seen it, the spot starts with a truck driver in a red Vanilla Coke van, and a driver in a blue Pepsi Vanilla van stops right beside each other at a red light. The Vanilla Coke driver turns on his car stereo and it plays heavy metal/rock music with a smirk on his face.

The Pepsi driver flips a switch and his van has these huge ghetto blaster speakers playing hip-hop, and the vehicle bounces up and down with hydraulics like a low rider. The Coke driver is impressed, while the pedestrians (coincidently are black and Latino) applaud the Pepsi driver. As the Pepsi driver leaves, the caption reads "Pepsi Vanilla, the Not-So Vanilla vanilla."

Personally, I thought that was more racist toward minorities than the Reebok spot, especially since the Reebok spot hasn't played in a while.

But do you think both commercials are both guilty of using racial stereotypes to get our attention, or are we taking these ads a little too serious than we should?