Backlash or Marketing Savvy? The dangers of brands waging culture wars with M&Ms

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After reading that candy company Mars Wrigley was “pausing” new female candy characters this week because they disturbed the peace of a polarized population, I was reminded of another purple character. . Make the world a few experts.

In early 1999, when a friend of mine was allowed to carry a six-foot antique spear on a plane because it wouldn’t fit in his luggage, Reverend Jerry Falwell Sr. I made a headline warning that it has been done. In Britain, they were promoting a gay lifestyle to their children. Falwell considered Tinky Winky, a manly purple “Teletubby” with a triangle on his head and a cute red handbag, to be dangerous. (For those who grew up on Monty Python When magic roundabout, it was another day on TV. )

As Falwell argued today According to an interviewer at the time, Katie Couric, Tinky Winky said, “Little boys run around with purses and act effeminate, masculine men, feminine women out, gays It could lead to ‘throw away the idea that there is no problem’.Apparently I didn’t realize the purple singing dinosaur was named Bernie I was yelling “I love you, I love you” in another time frame.

That controversy was arguably blown out of proportion on both sides. Falwell later admitted that he had never heard of Tinky Winky or Tinky Winky. teletubbies before someone else posts their opinion National Liberty Journalhe only used the reaction as an opportunity to preach an anti-LGBTQ+ stance. Meanwhile, critics and journalists spent the day using Tinky Winky as a mocking symbol for Falwell and religious rights .

Candy for Conservative Professionals

Fast-forward a generation, and this time the purple menace is an anthropomorphic M&M, who, along with her brown and green sisters, have been “woke up” by Fox News host and Moral Majority descendant Tucker Carlson. I was ridiculed for being unattractive. No need to double check all the details.For example, imagine a laut like Biff back to the futureand imagine his face when he finds out that the Hot Candy character has traded his stilettos for utilitarian block heels.

Carlson knows the conditions of good television. Of course, when we find out that female candy her character is back, this time we’re holding hands and hanging out her pack of “all-female” candy to raise money to help the women, and we’re going to put that in the show as well. Used. An awakened M&M is back, he proclaimed. (honey please grab me Nestlé for Men…) Director Greta Gerwig can take comfort in knowing that she’ll probably get plenty of airtime when her feminists take on the challenge. barbie It will finally appear later this year.

Was candy company Mars trying to be inclusive and inspiring to create more diverse M&M characters? Were they really trying to attract customers to attract money and attention to women who were “breaking the status quo”? Could you have predicted a similar blow from a similar cast of characters when building on previous campaigns?

Then why did it break?

oops we broke the internet

It is unknown.The most surprising thing about this latest battle in Candyland is that Mars decided to put the Candy mascot on an “indefinite suspension” just weeks after the start of the campaign. Tweet Posted Monday, the company sounded almost triumphant, stating that “even candy shoes can be polarizing” while claiming it never intended to “break the internet.”did they break the internet?)

To be clear, the “controversy” over the character’s footwear erupted a year ago. did not stop Still, the latest thorns thrown in the latest “all-female” candy campaign are now proving too many. I was. Goodbye, “spokescandies.” Hello Maya Rudolph, Public Relations Manager! (Join Super Bowl LVII to learn more about Rudolph’s new ad!)

Now, like Pavlov’s dogs, we have angry extremists, far-right commentators, heartthrobs who bullied good brands into shutting down fun campaigns aimed at supporting and empowering women. You’re supposed to blame narrow-minded bastards. Don’t get me wrong. I have a daughter who is a lesbian, and some commentators have gone deep into the constant effort to dehumanize certain segments of the population for the sake of sports and ratings, or to strengthen their fragile egos. I am troubled.

All the more reason why companies like Mars resist joining the culture wars to generate buzz for their products. In a cheeky social media message, he announced that he was putting “girls” aside to make way for Ms. Rudolph (now tasked with bringing us together in a way that candy-coated chocolate can’t). The thing was, if nothing else, shoddy. Right or left, many of us aren’t really in favor of the idea of ​​empowered candy.

I confess I passed when I was pitched to M&M’s latest marketing “campaign” to support women, which launched on January 5th. (Hey Mars, I changed my mind!) Something about celebrating an “all-female” pack where the women are actually cartoon candy characters felt contrived and unnewsworthy. I vaguely remember the hype for television over the move to shoes and a more inclusive image, but I’m less concerned if Tucker Carlson thought this new crop was a more dated batch of candy. I didn’t. Anger is baked into his brand. I’m not interested in promoting polarization by playing that game.

So why is Mars showing off a sideline character he was pitching two weeks ago in a big way? It’s hard to know how this artificial hype affected sales. As a sole proprietorship business, you are not required to report earnings. These peanut M&Ms are often the first to hit the market. forbes kitchen. M&M is back in the Super Bowl, too, and Mars has plenty of other products that could have earned a star. (The iconic Snickers commercial silence with the late Betty White.)

More importantly, Mars is a company that values ​​inclusion. When I interviewed Victoria Mars when she received the “Holland on the Hill Heineken Award” in 2016, I learned that she and her family have a deep and long-standing commitment to diversity and creating opportunities for women. I know there are So does Maya Rudolph.

No more reasons not to play this game. As a setting, it’s not very interesting. Many brands struggle to find common ground in this increasingly polarized country. Mocking or showing fold to the more hateful elements of society helps no one.

I’m curious what other people think. If all presses are good presses, I would say this is a slam dunk. (Sorry, football fans.) But it feels like a tactic that makes fun of a real problem we all have to work out.

The CxO will be on vacation next week as I will be taking a break. see you soon.