Consumer Behavior: Building Marketing Strategy 13th Edition by Delbert Hawkins, David Mothersbaugh

تمرين 24

Cause Marketing "Baked into the Brand" at Toms Shoes
A Target store popped up on Times Square in New York City, one of the most expensive pieces of real estate in the country. The store interior was blanketed in a sea of pink products-pink bicycles, sweaters, flip-flops, tee shirts. Outside a coffee cart served pink donuts. All proceeds during the store's short one-month existence went to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. 61 For every home Habitat for Humanity builds for the homeless in North America, Whirlpool donates a range and a refrigerator. 62 Hand in hand with the Red Cross, P G Tide's "Loads of Hope" provides mobile laundromats to victims of natural disasters (e.g., New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina). 63
These cause-marketing campaigns establish a partnership between a corporation and a nonprofit and often result in "doing well by doing good." Marketers increase their bottom line amid a halo of goodwill, while nonprofits receive needed contributions and public attention, and consumers purchase goods for themselves and thus contribute to a worthy cause. Despite the benefits of a win-win-win, critics have pointed out the downside of cause marketing. Corporations may come to lose consumer trust if consumers perceive the corporate-cause relationship as exploitation of the charity. Rather than contribute directly to nonprofits, cause marketing may be teaching consumers to contribute only when they receive something in return and at no cost to themselves. Unlike the unfettered contributions received directly from the public, the contributions charities receive in partnership with corporations may come with strings and obligations. 64
However, the success of Toms Shoes puts a new twist to cause marketing. Toms Shoes does not partner with a nonprofit or charity. Rather, Toms Shoes is a "for profit" company with the cause "one for one" baked into the brand. For each pair of Toms shoes consumers buy, the company donates a pair of Toms shoes to children who need shoes but cannot afford them. In spring 2013 Toms Shoes donated 13 million pairs of shoes in 59 countries. It is now expanding its efforts to eyeglasses in 15 countries. The "baked in brand" strategy of Toms Shoes has been described as a metastory-story telling through action. The consumer act of buying Toms shoes tells the story about the brand and the consumer. The story came first. The "for profit" status of the firm makes doing the right thing sustainable. 65
Do the concerns that surround cause marketing apply to the new form of cause marketing such as Toms Shoes